Turning 27

Oh, how the years go by. Tomorrow I'll be 3 years closer to 30. I haven't seen any gray hairs as of yet. On my morning walk, in the cool of the trees and river path, I thought about what I accomplished as a 26 year old.

I came up with the following:

• Applied, got accepted to, and started graduate school.
• Finished my year of AmeriCorps service.
• Made two Amish quilts.
• Locked up my keys 5 times (Twice in the house, three times in the car): a new record.

And that was the list. . . [Crickets chirping].

If I was a goal oriented person (which I semi-am), I would feel that this last year was not my most productive. But as I am a relationally-oriented person foremost, I've continued thinking, and while all the rest are works in progress (aka lifetime pursuits), I none-the-less consider the following as productive pieces of my mortal probation:

• Started the healing process after our miscarriage
• Reaching outside of myself to make new friends
• Trying to stay connected with old friends
• Learning and loving more about my eternal companion every day
• Mourning with those that mourn
• Self-recognizing blind spots and pride in all their secretive and entitling ways
• Continuing a love-affair with the Word of God
• Keeping hope for the future
• Living in the moment (every now and then)
• Forgiving old hurts from myself in all my foolishness and others in all their humanness
• Eating healthier
• Doing something physically demanding every day
• Grappling with life's questions, heartaches, pains, and mysteries with continued faith in the Healer of all wounds.

I'd like to say that as a 26 year old I became a mother. Maybe I did. I feel different. I'd like to say that at 26, my husband entered his first year of medical school. He didn't, but I've seen more and more reasons why he already is a healer. I'd like to say that I rid myself of all bad habits, social blunders, and selfish ways, but I didn't. And good thing, because what would I have to look forward to in turning 27? :)

Frogs and Mules

Have I told you about our backyard pasture? Well, technically, it's not ours, but the tiny yard we do have backs up to a mule pasture. I love to draw the curtains and let the every now and then Portland sunshine stream into our happy kitchen. . .

You can see the actual pasture here (behind us):

I can't explain the happiness I experience when I look out back and see "our mules". They come up next to the gate; we've even fed them apples. I delight in their daily habits--when they whinny and hee-haw like donkeys, when they gallop in a pack (there are 5 of them), when they trot back and forth, back and forth, when they curl up on the ground for some warmth.

Tonight, on Valentine's day night, we got home and as we walked up to the front door, I heard the croaking chorus of frogs out in the pasture. Just like the country. Of course, the 2-4 frogs that seem to live under our house and inside our dryer vent aren't as thrilling, but the effect of far-off frogs was pleasing tonight.

Simple things. Happy things. Frogs and mules.

One year ago

On Feb 2nd of last year, I'd had a pretty great day at work and came home to have dinner. I wanted to check on some insurance information and went to open a drawer when I felt the sensation of water coming from inside me. I was 14 weeks pregnant at the time--way too early for my water to break, way too early for labor, way too early for all my dreams of being "mommy" to be dashed.

After calling the on-call doctor and being told it may not be too bad, to wait it out and call the doctor in the morning, and after trying to get in touch with my doctor all the next day for an ultra sound that would finally be scheduled two days later, I went to bed with the blessing Tyler gave me as my only source of peace.

In the early hours of Feb 4th, I learned deeper meanings of the words loss, pain, numbness, cold, emergency room, toilet, placenta, baby, suffering, and anguish than I had yet to experience. Tears and screaming escaped without warning. Love and compassion poured down and out from my eternal Father, eternal companion, and my eternal family and friends.

Grief is something you travel on your own. It doesn't matter who else "had a miscarriage" or "lost a loved one" when you are the one who is hurting. Sympathy is not needed and empathy does not exist, for each person's suffering is unique, save Christ only.

How grateful I am that the Lord entrusted me with a little time to learn the honor of motherhood. How blessed I feel to have deeply personal experiences that assure me of life beyond the mortal grave no matter how awful and dark that grave may be.

I made this quilt to symbolize the baby we never held in our arms, but now hold with our hearts. It was our miscarriage, never to be replicated, never to be forgotten.

2 years ago

I made a calendar for T for his birthday in May and sent it to press with January 15th as the 2 year anniversary of our first date. Tyler made me this fabulous surprise candlelight dinner while I was away getting sugar free ice cream from cold stone (wouldn't suggest it--if you're going to splurge, do it right) to celebrate that blessed night two years ago...

We realized the next day that the actual date was January 17th. It fell on a Sunday this year, so we didn't worry about celebrating twice. Carpe Diem.

Feeling Problem-Saturated?

There's this concept in therapy (mostly based in narrative therapy, where you retell and and restructure a lot of the stories you've always told to yourself about life and stuff) called externalization. I love this concept.

Instead of thinking things like "I am depressed" or "I am a mess" you think in terms of your relationship with your challenges. For example, a therapist might ask the first person, "When do you remember your relationship with Depression beginning?" or "When was a time in your life when Depression wasn't able to shake your hand?"

And messes. . .heaven knows (and my sisters) how the worst insult for me is to be called messy (or fat, for that matter :). So when the temptation comes to look at my school books sprawled all over the floor, table, desk, and couch and say to myself "Why are you so messy?" (like right now), I will say instead "Messes love your company, don't they? You are fun person to be around--lots of people want to be around you--isn't it great that you get to choose your friends?".

This way, I have a choice and am not continuing to label myself. Good stuff. . .

Family

I just spent 14 days with the people that make life so glorious and beautiful. Family: I think it's my favorite six letter word (Tyler is five letters). You know what I'm talking about--the warmth, the compassion, the let-it-all-hang-out moments, the food, the tears, the strength. I miss them.

I triumphed over my first semester of graduate school

This is a happy day. With three minutes to spare, I emailed my professor to let him know that I finished my last of MANY books of the semester. . . and that was the end. The end!! For a few weeks, anyway.

And I COULD NOT have done this without the support of my chief editor, bottle washer, and cook, the magnificent Tyler Joseph Anderson. Seriously, by the end of this thing, he'll know as much or more about family therapy than I do. He has read and edited every paper, listened to me spill my guts about all the reasons I am not fit to be a therapist, and anxiously helped me analyze our own families and marriage (well, maybe anxiously is a bit of a stretch, but he definitely was patient).

T's not home tonight--working late. This moment of triumph is missing half of its provider (brought of course by the letter, the man, the companion of my dreams and reality--get it? reali--T?)

By triumph I mean that I worked and read and wrote my tail off. Two A's to report so far--I haven't cared about grades since high school. Now I think about each subject and my need to retain all that knowledge for actual clients, children, and families.

This is my forte--this is where I need to be. A lot of stress, brain, money, and soul are going into this degree. It seems that the rest of what I thought my future would hold rests on this part of my earthly mission. My patriarchal blessing says that many will come to me for counsel in my life; I never pictured that meaning a therapy degree, but the Lord is in this.

His goodness faileth never. . .