The First Year of My Twenties: Debbie & Leslie

This will be the year I turn 30. Before the new decade begins, I want to reflect on each year of my 20s and the people who impacted me. December is already the time of thinking of far-away loved ones, writing cards, and praying blessings on all the friends collected in different stages of life. Two mentors in particular are on my mind tonight.

The summer I turned 20 I was working in College Hall. One work study job had led to another work study job which then opened up a summer nine-to-five. Really I should say that one great boss recommended me to someone who became another great boss who then created an entirely new job description so that I could work there full time after the end of the school year. These two women took me in and looked after me as if I was a family member. In a way, the whole school community was like a family. Debbie and Leslie were two of the reasons why it felt that way. 

I met Debbie on my first college visit. She was the administrative assistant for the education department. I was trying to decide between two schools and this one was in 2nd place. After a few minutes in that office, it moved into 1st. I was hesitant about how it could work, but the department head Michele and her secretary Debbie immediately put their heads together to puzzle a way for me to graduate in 3 years. From the beginning I knew both practically and personally that I would be taken care of there. Debbie cared for me so well that she became the only person other than my own mother for whom I have ever written a “Happy Mother’s Day” card.

Debbie took me on as her student worker my freshman year. My first day on the job, she gave me an envelope and an address to print on it. She left for a meeting and let me figure it out on my own. Sure enough, it took me the length of the meeting to wrangle the software and printer to produce the single envelope. She always gave the help I needed while expecting just the right amount of independence. She expected my mistakes and encouraged my ideas. Even though she wasn’t technically a professor in the education department, I learned just as much about teaching from her as any member of the faculty. 

Debbie was a true friend and Friend. Her Quaker faith permeated every calm word she spoke in that office where so many things tested her patience day in and day out. It stood the test. She discussed the deepest of theological differences with absolute peace and openness. We worshipped in silence at the Wednesday Quaker meeting. I loved God more because of her love and dutifulness toward Him.

When Debbie heard that the president’s office was looking to hire their first student worker, she connected me with Leslie. Leslie was at the center of all the madness in this college, and yet her office was the place everyone felt most relaxed. She was so congenial that people would flock to her desk just to talk with her. The constant distractions made it hard to get anything done, but she couldn’t help that people wanted to be around her. Leslie made you feel like a fellow conspirator in a secret mission to have fun in every task. She was so popular that in order to get any work done, I would have to take her place in grand central station while she hid away in my closet of an office. 

Leslie laughed easily and kept everyone else laughing too. She had a funny way of saying absolutely normal things as if she were confiding something embarrassing to you. She made tedious tasks bearable. She always misheard things incorrectly in a harmlessly ridiculous way. And most of all she took a genuine interest in each person who walked into her office. We all felt that genuine concern through the way she asked questions about our lives and the chocolate she offered from the candy bowl as consolation for our worries. We had so many encouraging, deep, spiritual, and personal discussions that were just what I needed at that point in my life. 

I learned from Debbie and Leslie that professionalism didn’t mean knowing what to do in every circumstance. They had to figure things out as they went. They built the confidence in me to make decisions and take responsibility for whatever came my way. They showed me how to gracefully handle the stressors of day to day life, Debbie with a calm persistence and Leslie with a sense of humor. I saw them go out of their way every single day to be kind to the people around them, and I still feel blessed that I got to be around them during that exciting crossroads of the first year of my 20s. 

Countably Infinite

I've attended enough school plays, middle school sporting events, and children's holiday concerts to know that I need to mentally prepare for them. They particularly amplify my feeling of singleness and childlessness. You would think that bridal showers, weddings, baby showers and meal train visits to families with new little ones would be the more likely events to do this, but oddly they don't. It's sitting in an audience, watching from a distance, clapping and cheering and watching the parents and grandparents around me take pictures. For some reason, that's what wakes up the feeling in me most. I wonder what it would be like to watch my child grow, and what it would be like to look over at the seat next to me and see my child's father watch him or her grow too.

I know ahead of time that these events require a balance beam act inside my heart and mind. I have to allow the longing for something beautiful without tipping over to the natural feeling of bitterness. To prepare my heart, I pray. To prepare my mind, I consider countably infinite sets. 

Some types of infinity are larger than others. The countably infinite sets (integers, natural numbers, rational numbers) go on without an end. So do the uncountably infinite sets (real numbers, irrational numbers), but these contain more numbers than the countably infinite sets. What does all this have to do with hoping for a family? Understanding that there are different types of infinity justifies my aching and condemns my bitterness all at once.  

In this metaphor, family life is an uncountably infinite set. It's the vastest and highest thing I can imagine on this earth. I watch in awe as my friends marry and become parents. They are swept up in something far beyond them, creating with God and caring for eternal souls of priceless worth. The layers aren't countable - they have depth within depth and color within color. Being a mother is the most real and most irrational thing a woman can do. Of course I am enthralled by its enormity. I wouldn't want to give up the awe for the sake of coping. I believe some women have traded their awe for motherhood for cynicism in order to protect themselves. Many could not get it back even when their children were born, and their families suffer deeply. 

I want to hold on to this regard toward family life, even when it's painful. A future husband and children would be more than worthy of all this longing. Even if I never receive the gift, the world needs men and women who regard the family as it should be regarded - an infinite gift. Fewer careless vows would be taken, fewer children born unwelcomed, fewer people abandoned and alone. 

The uncountably infinite is worth the awe. But the countably infinite keeps me from heartbreak at the infinite loss of not being a wife and mother. What is the countably infinite? This smaller set of numbers still goes on forever. Is it more graspable because it is smaller? No, it is still far beyond anything I can fathom. And this is a metaphor for the gifts I receive every day in my current state of life. The treasures of these eternal souls are no less priceless to me because instead of "mother" they call me "teacher." The role I have in the lives of many dear children is a high calling far above what I could reach in a lifetime. A parent's role is higher, and I acknowledge and honor this, but try not to waste time comparing infinities. My countably infinite world holds enough awe to last forever. So when I see the light in the eyes of the children who call me neighbor, cousin, teacher, sister, or godmother, I soak it in, and my heart overflows. 

Interjection

What is really going to change at Christmas? 

I wondered this as I struggled through a very turbulent Advent. The season was burdened beyond my strength to carry and strung with regular breakdowns. People kept trying to encourage me by saying Christmas break was coming, but I only felt dread at the huge workload built up to fill any amount of "time off." Ground down to a state of rawness, old feelings were exposed and burned redder. Old hopes were still deferred, swollen by time. Inadequacies were confirmed by repeated failures, and disappointments seemed perfectly timed for Advent verses including such phrases as "the night is advanced" (Romans 13), "on that very day his plans perish" (Psalm 146), and "take as an example of hardship and patience" (James 5). I felt like "the desert and the parched land" in Isaiah 35, but I knew that would not go away just because the calendar advanced from December 24 to 25. It's unpleasant to admit, but my thoughts were stuck on the fact that Jesus was already born and he wasn't going to be born in some new way at Christmas. He came a long time ago and it didn't change the reality that I was miserable. 

I did know, at least, that there was a point to the misery. Every wave of unfulfilled longing could push me further out from the illusion that earthly things fulfill. Part of the purpose of liturgical seasons like Lent and Advent is to isolate the ache for God. I was definitely aching, and doing my best to orient that in the direction of Heaven. But Heaven was still just as far away as before I pointed my pain toward it, and it (probably) still would be when Advent ended in bells and feasting. How could I set aside the pain for joy at Christmas? 

The Church is wise to recognize the holy place of suffering in God's redemptive plan for us. Friday penances, Lenten fasts and Advent practices all draw our attention to this. For those who are already suffering, liturgy comes alongside and lift up what is already there (as it did for me this December). But of course the patterns of our lives don't follow systematic calendars, and sometimes liturgy interjects suffering into an otherwise happy season as a difficult reminder or discipline. That is how I have usually experienced penitential seasons, but this year Christmas became the difficult interjection - the reminder of the holy place of joy in God's plan. 

The same thoughts and feelings still weigh on me even now that the priest wears white instead of purple. But the practice and discipline of joy means that I choose to spend time in thoughts of Christ's victory. He will surely come again! The surety comes from the knowledge that he already came and put into motion the victory that cannot be reversed. Right now it's easy to focus on the ways I am apart from Him and suffering for it. But it's my duty to remember that He will raise me to Himself. From here, the road ahead looks long and painful, but from Heaven it will appear beautiful because it will have led me home to my God. It is an exercise of hope and trust to place my mind in that state of future joy, and in that perspective to celebrate the season. The thoughts on which I choose to focus are what change at Christmas: "the day is at hand," "let us go rejoicing to the house of the Lord," "indeed we call blessed those who have persevered," "the desert and the parched land will exult," "a savior has been born to you."

Songs from 2018, Part 3: Movement

          We're ready to go,
          say goodbye to our homes,
          and now our bed is where we make it
          out on the road.
          "Go" by Vocal Few

This year I actually became more "settled," beginning year 2 of living in the same house and working at the same job. Maybe this is part of why the idea of movement struck me so strongly in these songs. Not because I was feeling restless to travel, but because I became more aware of the dangers of passivity. Floating along a "status quo river" has few rewards.

          And the path we take is older still
          All our ancestors traversed it,
          trading comfort for wilderness.

Exploration and risk are elements that should be part of every life, even settled ones. There are always ways to stretch, initiate, raise your aims.

"1000 Feet" by Scott Mulvahill (and Move and Shake) also really speak to me about intentional change. Probably my favorite lyric of the year comes from this song:

          There's a mountain in my way. 
          Oh, there's a mountain in my way.
          Who's gonna be the one to move?

Listening to that line for the first time, I felt like I'd been caught. There are plenty of obstacles in my life that are easy to complain about or even ignore, hoping they'll just go away on their own. This song points out how ridiculous it is to live like that, and shows that movement doesn't have to happen all at once, but one foot at a time.

I see two different types of movement in Madison Cunningham's "To Another Land." One is negative:

          Oh, I wish that I could escape myself,
          but they say trains don't go out that far.

Exploration and newness are wonderful - for the right reasons. This is why movement has to come after surety. There needs to be a foundation from which to go. Madison shows how movement for the sake of disconnection can't bring satisfaction. (Interestingly, she also sings about the wrong and right way to stay in Window). Going outside of yourself to genuinely connect with others is the risk - and reward - in movement correctly oriented.

          Pick up that left hand groove man,
          beat on the side of your money can,
          play your song to another land,
          take me with you as far as you can.

In 2019, my biggest goal is to go outside myself. I want to encounter God in epiphany, know him in surety and meet others in movement. And after reflecting more deeply on each of these favorite songs from 2018, I hope as I keep them in my musical rotation, they can keep inspiring me to do it!

Songs from 2018, Part 2: Surety

Part 1.

Epiphany is the sudden realization of truth, but surety is a full trust in truth's unmoving security. However, I've learned that trust isn't always a feeling. Sometimes trust is nose-to-the-grindstone work. It takes effort to return again and again to the rock after being blown by winds of difficulty, even if you always know the rock will be there. There's an element of clinging to surety. The truth doesn't move, but you do - falling from weakness over and over again. I recognize this in the lyrics of "A Better Word" by Bethany Barnard.

          I hear the blood of Abel speak
          in accusation over me.
          I'm guilty and I am in need
          of mercy. 

But every time this happens, no matter how many times it happens, we can to return to the prayer-refrain:

          You have broken 
          the power of my sin.
          The curse I lived in
          has been reversed.

          The blood of Jesus
          is my provision.
          You have spoken
          a better Word.

As Hebrews says, "we have confidence to enter the sanctuary by the blood of Jesus." This is eternal, never-changing, constant and sure!

"Gallows" by Jess Ray on Spotify

This song is a reminder that no matter how much it seems like the devil has the upper hand, as Christians we already know the ending, and we're on the winning side. 

          the harder the wind will blow,

          the deeper our roots will go

Darkness might feel powerfully suffocating, but light obliterates it so immediately. We simply have to open the shades.

          It will flood a blinding light
          it will chase away the night.
          Even if you shield your eyes,
          let it pour in, let it pour in! 

With "Dawn," Jake Scott is yet another artist I've followed through the lyrical changes of falling in love and getting married (including Jess and Beth). But beyond the basic storyline of building a family, I enjoy this song for the way he expresses his place in the world very simply.

          I'm in love

One might wonder how I get a theme of surety from this song when it talks about being displaced, broken and changed. But the sheer number of times he says...

          I'm in love

...shows an absolute surety about who he is and what everything means (or doesn't mean) to him. It's the home where he exists, and it reminds me that love has to be the foundation from which you reach out to the world...to be continued in Songs of 2018, Part 3: Movement. 

Songs from 2018, Part 1: Epiphany

I love songs the way I love books. Stories, themes and symbolism can all be as powerfully communicated through 3 minutes of music as they can in a full-length novel. Lyrics do the telling, which is why the words are just as important to me as the sound of a song. While re-listening to some of my favorites from this year, I tried encapsulating what each one was about in a single word, and found that 3 ideas kept appearing. The first: epiphany. 

Epiphany is a sudden widening of your world. "Ghost of a King" by The Gray Havens widens into a new world altogether. It's a meeting that whirls into a supernatural journey and ends in a healing shock of water. The man in the song knows he's broken, but learns that the broken part of him belongs to the supernatural world he never knew existed. He discovers in immediate succession the impossible hopelessness of his state...

          you are a lonely soul 
          with a heart of stone that rakes against your thirsty bones

...and the impossible hope of newness.

          Where no chariot can take you,
          where the river meets the sand,
          there is water there that can quench your thirsty bones
          and make you well.

I recognize all the moments I've felt most alive in Beta Radio's "All at Once I Saw It All." It begins with homesickness for the unknown - a grasping at infinity. You reach and reach until the moment you glance back at time-bound reality. Then in the light of forever, life strikes you in an epiphany. 

          How rare and beautiful
          that we were ever even born.

It's as if the whole of life can briefly be seen "to scale," but of course that also includes a fearful awareness of its end. 

          The ghost parade a shroud,
          my body rearranged.

And you're left reaching for eternity only fiercer than before. 

I think Taylor Leonhardt expresses the bewilderment and joy of epiphany in her song "Everything" (and "Surprising Me" from the same album). I love the discovery of something so significant that it touches every part of living. You get to run from one thing to the next, watching it change in front of you, soaking in the novelty of re-orientation. 

          You flipped the whole thing around

          dropped the sky to the ground

          you are here with us now.

The end of this song brings me to the second overarching idea in my favorite songs this year: surety. To be continued in Part 2...

Not a "Not" Person

If my 5th-grade self could have peeked into a crystal ball, she would probably have viewed my math education career as unforgivably traitorous. The battle lines between Sylvia (age 10) and Dad (her math teacher) were firmly established. War was declared, battles fiercely fought, and the eventual peace treaties which were necessary for us to put in writing still exist in a storage box. I was firmly convinced I was "not a math person." Dad's natural abilities in math, plus the fact that he was my parent AND math teacher, put us at what seemed like hopeless enmity. I was outraged that he wouldn't just "tell me how to do it," but that he rather attempted to explain abstract mathematical concepts (which involved "extra" thinking and work) before slowly circling around the shortcut or algorithm (which was all I cared about). I resisted learning the concepts because they were difficult, resulting in misuse of the easy algorithms because I didn't understand what they meant or how to apply them sensibly. 

On the other hand, I knew I was good at reading. It came so much more easily and was actually enjoyable. Entire chapter book series were eaten up in a week or two, and I remember the day the children's librarian couldn't find a single book on World War II from the juvenile section that I hadn't read. My piano teacher was indignant when this 10-year-old brought Jane Eyre to read while sitting on the couch through my sister's lesson. She refused to believe I was actually comprehending it, and she was partly right. I read books that were too difficult for me, picking out chunks of understanding, but knowing a lot was going over my head. Those books went in the library bag anyway because I had the confidence that if I kept reading them, I would eventually get it. 

It took until junior year of high school for the realization to break that practicing math eventually led to mastery too!

In college, I concentrated in language arts and math education with a mission to prove that "not a math person" and "not a reading person" are myths. Just like piano skills are first learned by practice and then enjoyed, so math and reading skills are practiced, mastered and then enjoyed. Sometimes natural skills enable enjoyment in the beginning, and that often motivates further practice. But so many people operate under the groundless assumption that just because they don't naturally enjoy something, that means they never can. 

That might sound painfully obvious, but it goes against a deeply established narrative in our culture. I encounter it constantly in my line of work and sometimes with my students. That's right, the kids I teach on a day-to-day basis are not the ones primarily posing this. Their parents, in email correspondence, conferences, phone calls and even friendly chatter, echo each other with remarkably similar comments: "I can't help them with their math homework," "I was never good at math," "I have to send them to ______ for those questions," "I'm not a math person." 

Faculty lounge lunches carry similar refrains, ranging from "I could never teach math" to "I can't cook" or "I'm not an exercise person." My co-workers were amazed when I told them the story of my dad's long mission to overcome his distaste for tomatoes - now one of his favorite foods. We all know people are born with likes and abilities, but it was absolutely foreign to them that someone could choose additional ones. I remember feeling the same way in college when a professor shared the story of his mom's transformation from a stiff, awkward person to a "great hugger" simply because she decided to practice physical warmth with others. At that point, I had learned my lesson about math, but never transferred the lesson to other parts of my seemingly static personality. 

Over time, I've slowly tried to adjust the wording around my deficits. Instead of "I don't have an artistic bone in my body," it's "I've never spent much time drawing or sketching." Rather than "I kill every plant I've ever owned," it's "I want to learn how to grow things." I was delighted to visit my friend recently and hear the story of her "plant hospital." Even though she never had what she considered a green thumb, she decided to pay closer attention to her succulents each day to find out what made them thrive. After moving the pots around and trying different amounts of watering, the greenery on her windowsill looked lovely and healthy, and she had the wonderful feeling of having learned something new. 

Now I have some projects of improvement in my life. Of course the goal is not to become a master in all the areas of deficit. For some things, changing my attitude and language is enough. I realized for the first time this year that hating winter and complaining about being cold has been a hugely unnecessary energy drain my whole life. Why not train my brain and body to withstand the cold? Why not intentionally look for and appreciate the strikingly beautiful elements of winter? For some deficits, I'm simply working to become more proficient. And a few areas - those that I believe will enrich my life and those around me most - will be long-term efforts to master. But even if I never reach those goals, I know life will be enriched by reaching for them, knowing that they're not "not" possible. 

Skills to improve: 

gardening

shopping 

cooking

decorating

hosting guests

listening

physical affection

rising early

hair care

art

crafting

event planning

house maintenance 

giving gifts

correspondence

musical accompaniment