Goodbye 2015

It’s January, 2016, and tomorrow morning I’ll return to work after a glorious Christmas holiday spent with pieces of my family in Budapest, Hungary, and a dear friend in Carlisle, England.

I’ve been back in Kenya for not quite a day and a half, and the grading has already re-started (a consequence of spending the break reading The Brothers Karamazov, watching the new Star Wars three times [and marathoning the classics (the prequels too, but those more from a sense of duty than delight)], cat-napping daily, playing games, walking up and down the Christmas-lit streets of Budapest, drinking coffee, eating chimney-cakes, eating sausages, eating goulash, eating more chimney-cakes, playing board games, sitting in front of a fire, talking with my little brother, talking with my parents, visiting my friend on her 28th birthday [and realizing it was the anniversary (basically) of nineteen years of friendship] watching Sherlock [and more Sherlock], watching Doctor Who [and more Doctor Who], visiting my favorite bookshop in the world, buying books, eating hot cross buns, eating minced pies, eating mouth-watering Thai food, lying in bed all day and reading [did I mention The Brothers Karamazov? did I mention it’s over 700 pages?], and just being wonderfully, sleepily content and alive [rather than, you know, finishing up those last 68 papers that needed marking]) — so the new year is definitely underway.

Those who know me well know that I’ve never enjoyed change (which, now that I think about it, may seem somewhat ironic, given that, since graduating from college, I’ve moved six times, held five different jobs [6, if you count grad school as a job, which it somewhat is and mostly isn’t], lived on 3.5 continents [it’s difficult to tell where the Middle East falls, exactly], and spent time in 22 different countries). Even as a little girl, I hated the very thought of growing up: intrinsically aware, from my earliest memories, that the movement of time was analogous to loss.

In my old/wise age, I’m certainty growing into an awareness that time is also analogous to gift. But that still isn’t how I experience it, on a gut level. The changing of the year implies less to me about beginnings than it does about endings. One more year gone, never to return. Locked away in the vaults forever, doomed to slowly fade from memory, until only the pictures remain.

And not facing that fact has always seemed rather traitorous to me. Change — time — does mean endings. It does mean loss. And to pretend otherwise is to fail to respect, to honor, that which was, and was loved. Was needed. Was wanted. Was formative and transformative. Was life.

And is missed.

Which is why, I suppose, taking time to acknowledge and process — to name thresholds (the moments of change in my life) — has always seemed critical. I don’t want to be a person for whom the years pass without comment, or with only ever an eager, impatient look to the future — to the possibilities to come — without any acknowledgment of the past and what has been.

On the flip-side, I also don’t want to be a person who only ever wallows in faded memories, refusing the opportunities of today and tomorrow for the joys of yesterday. In C.S. Lewis’s Perelandra there is a significant theme of accepting the gift placed before one, now at this moment, rather than attempting to hold onto the gift of yesterday. And it is a practice I believe in. A spiritual discipline, if you will, of saying “yes” to the story God is unfolding, saying “yes” to the journey (rather than this specific destination). And I know it is a practice, a mindset, that I need to grow in. But that, too, is why I want to be a person who pauses at the thresholds. A person who takes a moment to look at all that has been handed her — who says “thank you” — before, in gratitude, letting it go, and moving forward with open palms.

A person who says, “This has been good” (which doesn’t mean “not challenging,” “easy,” or “without pain”), while also saying, “I trust the One who IS good to continue bringing goodness into my life, into my days, into my year, even if it never looks quite this way again.”

To reference Perelandra again, there are different fruits for different times, and that transience is part of what makes them so very, very sweet. Living in the Lake District for a year, I was overwhelmed (somehow for the first time in my life) by the changing of the seasons. By the soul-piercing, and unique, beauty of each month. Beauty that passed into other beauty — the lush green of summer, turning into the copper-red fells of autumn, which turned, in their turn, into the stark, bold trees of winter, and then, at last, when one’s spirit fairly ached for color, the flowers (snowdrops, daffodils, bluebells — each coating the hills, one after the other, but only emerging when its predecessor had faded from view). It taught me something, I think, that I have been struggling all my life to learn — that the coming AND the going are both, in their way, good (which doesn’t mean not challenging, easy, or without pain).

Which is all just a prelude to my annual (if I’ve done it once before, I can consider it annual, right?), “Meeting of the Years” post.

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Here were some of the significant milestones of 2015:

I completed my first year at Rosslyn. My first year living in Kenya.

The oldest of my “little” brothers got married. I was a bridesmaid at his wedding.

I spent time back in Jordan (complete with a camping trip to Wadi Rum (which, you might be interested in knowing, is where the movie The Martian was filmed, and is also one of my favorite places on earth) and a day snorkeling in the Red Sea (Aqaba)).

My 7th graders, back when they were 9th graders.

While in Jordan, I attended the graduation of a class of students I taught both as 7th graders and as 9th graders. It was incredibly special to be there (though it certainly made me feel old) — so, so proud of those crazy, and wonderful, kids.

I realized the life-long (or at least a long-lived) dream of doing a long walk with my brother. It was cut a bit short (I’m not actually sure it can be considered to have qualified as “long”), but it was still wondrous, combining three of the things I love most: my brother’s company, the Oregon Coast, and walking.

I dreaded my hair — the only real change I’ve made to it since cutting it short at age 6 or 7 (I’ve also dyed it twice [three times, I guess, if you count the strand of pink], but never particularly extremely or permanently)).

 

Current dread status.

This is what my hair does sometimes.

I started teaching AP English Language and Composition (a class that once terrified me, and probably still does). I love it (which is not to say that it is “not challenging,” “easy,” or “without pain”). My students are incredible and, since they’re all from last year’s Global Literature class, it means I get to teach them again (which might be teaching’s greatest joy: having students you love in class more than once). As a side note: you can check out some of their writing, if you’re interested, by following the links on the side (marked “My Students Write”) to their blogs.

I got the opportunity to teach a drama class — something I’ve missed since my Whitman days. It was dubiously productive, but certainly fun (and energy draining).

My parents are actually in this picture too — cleverly captured in the background.

I spent a lot of time in the presence of my parents and youngest brother — which maybe is the new norm, now that we’re the two singles of the family. It was delightful, though other siblings are certainly missed.

I explored various parts of Kenya. Swam in the Indian Ocean, camped in Tsavo, Ol Pejeta, and the Aberderes. Saw a real-life rhino (I am no longer convinced that zoo animals actually qualify as real, at least not in the same way). Saw a real-life baby rhino nurse (bet you didn’t know that baby rhinos are the cutest thing ever, but they are).

Watched part of the Rugby World Cup. This is significant, because it turns out I actually like rugby (unlike American football, it’s a sport both interesting and understandable [no offense]). Am thankful to have serious rugby fans as friends (friends patient enough to be willing to explain it to me).

I started co-leading a 9th grade girls’ Bible Study.

I started hanging out with some delightful people. Going to movies. Having game nights. Meal dates. Taking selfies. In other words (dare I say it?), Kenya is becoming a little more like home.

After many years of not holding babies, babies re-emerged into my life via a friend who fosters for one of the children’s homes here. So 2015 contained many more baby snuggles than 2014, and I am hopeful that 2016 continues this trend (it turns out that babies are an excellent source of readily available hugs).

I visited Hungary for the first time, adding a new country to my list, and achieving a first for our family — the first time we’ve celebrated Christmas (as a family) not at “home” (home, in this instance, refers to any space considered ours or an extended family member’s, such as a grandparent’s residence).

I participated in my favorite of all trends and family traditions — reading Dickens’ A Christmas Carol aloud. This has happened approximately once a year (sometimes more) since around the time I was born. I certainly have no memories of NOT doing it.

I participated in (and “won”) my 3rd NaNoWriMo (2nd consecutive while teaching full time). I have to admit, however, that it was a bit of a cheat — another collaborative work between me and a dear friend — and this time not even a coherent novel, bur rather a collection of short stories. Still, it was quite a bit of writing, and consistent writing at that. I wrote every day of November (never less than 750 words), and I’m proud of the feat.

And I did other things.  Like drinking lots of coffee and tea, grading lots of papers, and sometimes even sitting in the garden and reading.

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As for my goals for this year, I think they’re rather close to last year’s: keep striving for wakefulness and for life. Incorporate rhythms and habits (develop practices) that would create space for that life and encourage that wakefulness. Practice discipline and self-control in those areas (why is that so hard? why has that always been so hard?).

In more tangible terms, wake early. Read and reflect (journal; drink tea). Run after school. Get to bed early. Read under the covers (drink something decaf and delicious; probably eat cookies). And somewhere in there, write, write, write.

I’m not sure that daily writing, or weekly posting, is a goal I can achieve. But it’s a goal I want to work towards. My older brother is always encouraging me to develop the life I want to live, rather than waiting for it to happen upon me. And writing is certainly part of that life. So I want to make space for the discipline of it. So that that discipline can make space, on some days, during some moments, for the romance of it. The passion. The delight. The magic, and wonder, and awe. The inspiration. I want to show up (consistently, daily), and see what happens. What might be built over time.

One word, one sentence, at a time.

So, 2016, ready or not, here I come.

A Meeting Of Years

It’s January, that time of the year when we take stock of where we’ve been and where it is we aspire to be going.

And it has been quite the year.  I finished up my first year of teaching at the university level — finished it off with a bang, with considerably higher class ratings than in the fall, not to mention an Intro to Lit class that I was simply much more satisfied with, and a greater sense of enjoyment with teaching in general.

I turned in my first ever ‘two-weeks notice’ to my first ever ‘real’ job.  (Odd, I suppose, that I would define it as that after two years teaching high school, one year teaching college, and a year in between working in the Lake District, but I’d never before had the experience of going door-to-door with my resume, imploring minimum wage earnings from total strangers, and I wasn’t sure I’d be up for the challenge.)

I finished up my first year living in the States post-college; my first year living in the States of my own free will.  Also, my first year driving a car, and that with a fairly long bi-weekly commute.

I survived my first car accident (refer to the above paragraph on driving experience).

I went on my first ever cruise.

I was in the wedding of a dear friend (and former student).

I saw some beautiful, and long-missed, faces.

I moved to Africa.

I moved into my first ever solo apartment.

I started teaching American lit — and thus moved far outside of my comfort zone.

I participated in my second NaNoWriMo, completing my second novel — my first finished piece of co-operative fiction

I went on my first safari.

And the first of my younger brothers got himself engaged.

There were some other firsts in there, too — firsts that I’m sure I’ll write about one day — when they no longer feel quite so close and so personal.

And as for the where I am going — I don’t think I know any more than Abraham did when he accepted the call of God to wander in a land not his own, owning nothing but his wife’s burial plot, and leaving no evidence of his life but the two sons who outlived him (not counting the children of his concubines), and the testimony of a faith credited as righteousness.

I find deep comfort in the stories of the Old Testament, because so many of them are stories, not of accomplishment, but of submission — submission to a God too big to understand, and a journey — a sojourn — with no clear end in sight.

I don’t know where I am going, but I am trying to redirect my vision, not to the destination, but to the surrounding landscape.  To the details of my life, as it is being lived, day, to day, to day.

And so most of my goals for the coming year have to do with living the life I have, as well as I can, here, in this moment, day, by day, by day.

I want to read more, and write more, and cook more.  I want to practice hospitality — creating space, and welcome, for others, for God, for myself.  I want to immerse myself in the freedom offered by discipline — by rhythm and repetition and the simple, holy act, of following through.

And I want to grow in grace — grace for myself and for my students.  I want to grow in seeing them — in seeing myself — the way God see us: holy and dearly loved.  Fiercely enjoyed.  Worthy.

Simply put, I want to pursue life, I want to pursue God, I want to pursue others, I want to pursue myself — the self that God created me to be, the self that I am capable (through Him who grants us all we need for life and godliness) of being.

I want to be a tree, planted by streams of water, bearing my fruit in season.  Flourishing.

So, 2015, ready or not, here we come.