in case you were wondering

Sometimes I have these moments in which it occurs to me that I am a grown-up.

I mean... what?!

I was at the grocery store today and realized... here I am, choosing what food to buy with the money I have earned, and driving home in my leased car to my apartment, where I live with my husband and we sleep in the same bed and I don't have to hide this fact from my mother. We're paying bills and furnishing our home and planning for the future and working full time jobs and ... it's just kind of crazy, you know?

...that is all.

thanks, i like my glasses too

My one professor, who said he would be happy to recommend me for graduate school, hasn't turned in his letter. It was due on Saturday. The popular consensus is that I have to call him and speak to him directly about it. I mean, most likely he forgot (he's busy! and also a poet), and probably once I mention it he'll immediately feel terrible and send it in. But ... I don't want to call him. It feels so horribly confrontational. I don't want to make him feel bad, and I don't want to be in his face about a huge favor he is doing for me. I know, I know, he said he would, and it would just be being assertive--I get all of this. But it doesn't change the fact that presenting the problem to him (and in an actual conversation, not behind the safety of email) is terrifying.

Confrontation is one of those cliche things to be afraid of, and therefore, it really annoys me that I am so afraid of it. Especially because I also know exactly which childhood event made me hate it so much, and which other past events fueled that fear, and it's all so textbook that I feel like I really just need to get over it. And to make matters worse, the few times I do choose to be confrontational are usually influenced by adrenaline (or sometimes alcohol, but I never said that) and I go a little overboard and cause problems rather than actually being helpful. I have approximately one friend (you know who you are) with whom I am blatantly, confrontationally honest, but that's because our relationship started off that way. I was at a time in my life when I didn't have a lot to lose, and I was sick of not saying what I thought. That time, unfortunately, has passed.

What I hate most about this situation is the fact that it's not just about confrontation in the "let me tell you something you may or may not want to hear" sense. It's about how I live my life, and how I present myself to other people. It's about being afraid to be a person who makes a statement. It's about having people in my life who I really like, and want desperately to like me, but I spend so much time trying not to be a certain way that I forget to have a personality at all. And then when I let go and act like myself, I over-analyze other people's reactions and try to adapt my personality to fit what I think they want. Problem A: I'm really bad at reading people. Problem B: seriously, Piera? how old are you again? Apparently I never grew up past sophomore year. (actually, ironically, I was more outgoing in tenth grade than I am now. I try not to think about that.)

For example, I like the way I look without glasses. But aside from the fact that my eyes are totally messed up and it's hard for me to focus on things--it's scary not to wear them. I have big plastic colorful frames and I like them because they make a statement, and because people notice my glasses and not my face. It's not even that I don't like my face. I just feel exposed without something bold between me and the other person.

And then there's all this second-guessing before I even start a thing. I can't just let it be what it is, and deal with things as they come--I have to analyze it all and troubleshoot all the possible outcomes and then I end up not getting started in the first place. I downloaded the Couch-to-5K app on my phone, because I really do want to have some kind of workout routine. Partially it's to be healthy, partially it's to see if I'm less tired all the time, partially it's because I want to feel better about my body, partially (mostly?) it's because I want to still look good after I have babies, and I guess I should probably start that now. And I've heard good things about the Couch to 5K program, and it sounds kind of excellent because I have NO exercise in my life right now... but then there are all these factors to think about. Do I pay $1.99 for the actual app or just use the free knockoff version? Which three days of the week will I work out? Should I get a gym membership so I don't have to run in the icky cold snow? Should I go by distance or by time? Should I start doing yoga on my non-running days? Can I just get a yoga dvd and hope that I'm doing it right, or should I join a class? When will I have time for all of this?
...see problem B, above.
It's not like it's even that hard. The whole idea is you just ... start doing it, and see how it works out, and take it slow, and ease yourself into it. But apparently that's not good enough for me. I have to know what I'm doing and how it will work and I have to have a Plan before I can start doing anything. And then, you guessed it, nothing ever changes. Because I don't have the answers and I'm mostly just afraid to find out on my own.

It gets to me because I know better. I have a foundation that is stronger than my emotions, and more important than whether people like me. I am saved by grace through faith; I am living as a person who is free; God's grace toward me was not in vain. I know all of this. I think somewhere at my core I really do believe all of it--I just don't know how to make it relevant. There is a disconnect somewhere between eternal salvation and my everyday life. Because salvation matters on the grand, life-and-death-and-hope-and-a-future scale, and my personal interaction ... doesn't. Because I can't see how it matters whether I feel comfortable in my skin, whether people like me, whether I feel confident and useful and worthy. I believe so much in design and in the grand construction of time and the world, and I believe so strongly in καιρός (the Greek term for "the perfect moment" or "suitable/favorable occasion"), that I've taught myself not to worry about each individual moment. Time is fleeting, and what matters now won't matter in the end, so why bother worrying?

This belief is both a huge relief and a huge hindrance. On the one hand--if it doesn't matter, and if time is fleeting, why be anxious about asking my professor about his letter? The moment will pass. Be bold, be confident, live your life because you only have right now to do it. But it also makes it harder to get anything done, because if the moment will pass then why bother doing anything in the first place? My self-consciousness, my personality, my whole existence is just a moment in time in the grand scheme of things, so why should it be relevant? Does God's grace extend even to my feeling confident in everyday conversation, to my ability to speak clearly and boldly and without fear?

I know it does. I know it does, and that asking these questions is ridiculous. I was in Sunday school, I know all the stories about Jesus' love for his people. He turned water into wine at a wedding--how relevant was that on the grand scale, compared to feeding 5000 people or, you know, coming back to life? He hung out with the outcasts, and taught them, sure, but also probably just ... chilled, had conversation over dinner, that sort of thing. I know that God's love for the world doesn't just pertain to our salvation, but also to our lives--he knows how many hairs we have, he created our faces and our abilities and our preferences, he wants us to be happy. How many times have I said this to people or written about this or fallen back on it to shake off anxiety or depression? Like I said, I know better.

It's just ... hard. It's hard to remember that the little things matter. It's hard to remember that I matter, that people do like talking to me, that my professor will probably appreciate me calling him up to remind him about his letter because he really does want me to succeed. It's hard to look at the past and know where all these problems started, and then say "well, that sucked, but it's time to move on," but it's even harder to actually do it. It's hard to get off my ass and get stuff done, because it's so much easier and safer to stay here in my living room watching Bones than it is to take up new projects.

I'm going to call my professor, because it's more important for me to try to get into grad school than it is for me to be angsty about it. I'm (hopefully) going for a run (well, a walk) today because I want to start being healthier, but check back in a few weeks to see if I've made any progress. I went in and auditioned for a play because I miss acting, and it was kind of intimidating not to be around Concordia people who are supportive and fun, but I did it, and I feel pretty good about how it went down.

So there's all that. I need to hold on to my baptized, spiritual nature, and I need to remember that every moment, however temporary, counts for something. It doesn't count for everything, but that doesn't mean it isn't important.

And I need to remember that that same principle applies to me.

being a grown-up is hard (that's why they invented procrastination)

On the agenda for this week: applying for grad school (now that the stupid GRE is over with, thank goodness) and looking/applying for jobs (if you work with me now, you can keep that tidbit of information to yourself for the time being...).

Annnd surprise, I'm procrastiblogging! Why? Because like all homework, I like to do everything else before I hunker down to do the real thing I have to do (if you're considering me for a job, please erase that from the record) (it's different when it's for a job) (anyway I have almost never handed in anything late, even if I stayed up until 4am doing it. That's dedication).

The real point of this post, however, is my frustration with present circumstances. Let me explain. My car is leaking gas and generally falling apart, and we would like to get a new car in order to not be worrying about mine collapsing. But in order to do this, I need a second job. Second-job hunting has transformed into job hunting, because a new, better-paying full-time job would not be so awful (I'm very steadily losing the optimism I once had about humanity). So I head tra-la down Obnoxious Job Search Lane and wind up in the Neighborhood of Education-Related Job Opportunities, because I somehow always gravitate toward those. And, surprisingly enough, I have found a couple of leads and I am at present avoiding writing cover letters and so on for applications.

So, you're thinking, what is the problem here?

The problem is my brain. I want to go to grad school next fall (I'm happily assuming here that I will get into any/all of my options, just let me have my delusions thank you very much and yes I know this is a run-on sentence). And that school could be here in Madison, or maybe in Chicago, or heck maybe even in Iowa (?!). And if I step into a job that's more than just an $8/hr service industry gig, I'll only be able to do it for about a year if I move anywhere other than here, and even if I stay here, I don't know if I can juggle a full time job and full time grad school at the same time (no, now is not a good time to remind me that I'll probably have to do that). Plus, I won't know about school until probably December at the very earliest, but if I waited until then to look for new jobs (because one more year at the 'bux when the end is in sight... that's not SO bad...) means that I'd only be at the new job for less than a year if I move. SO naturally because I am me, I worry about whether I will be letting people down by quitting after how many months of learning a job and learning how to do it well--and then again, what if I don't do it well? What if I actually really suck at secretarial things even though I somehow always end up looking for those kinds of jobs? What if I just stay at my job now until I go to school (which will take a lot of patience and prayers because I am frustrated now after only a year) and then discover that I don't want to teach English Comp and/or I'm a bad English Comp teacher and I should have studied graphic design all along? What if I do all this work to apply to jobs and to school and at the end of it, I have no new job options and I don't get into the schools I applied to and... and...

...and this is about where my thought-train kind of sputters and dies, because... so, I'm thinking, what's the problem here?

I have a job right now--a full time, with benefits, steady job. I'm making money, even if it's not a lot, or not enough for the lifestyle I want. I have a bachelors degree, even if I don't go back to school, and I have a lot of various experience, and I already know it's not my calling to work at the 'bux for the rest of my life. I already know I want to do more, and I already know that God will guide me to where he wants me to be. If that's not the places I'm looking, then he'll put it directly in my face so I can't miss it. Goodness knows he's done that before.

Piera. Do you believe all that stuff you say about design, and about everything working out when and how it's supposed to? Then what is the problem here?

The problem is my brain. I think too much. And if I stopped thinking about it and just starting applying and whatnot, I probably would have avoided a lot of this drama.

But then, dear 4.7 readers, I would not have written this post about patience and design and the uselessness of angst. And if that isn't dramatic irony for you then I should have failed all of my theatre classes.

hell is for hipsters (i do so wish i could take credit for the title ...)

Keaton sent me this link to his friend's blog, and I was a little bit shocked to realize how close to home it hit. Which is, I think, a little ironic.

Quiet Lives of Desperation — or — Hell is for Hipsters

in which many various pieces of my brain suddenly made sense

My mom is from New Orleans. And by from, I mean she was born there, and then moved around a bunch (pastor's kid and all) and then returned to NO for high school.

She frequently laments that she raised "a bunch of damn yanks," but don't tell her I told you.

And I knew my mom was a big fan of southern hospitality, and that she still wants to move back there, but I never realized how much her love of the city was a part of me until Brett Will Taylor wrote this article. Mom sent me the link (surprise) and I click it to peruse, as usual, and suddenly I'm reading it thinking ... yep... me too... wow, weird.

I have a lot of fragmented thoughts in my head, but it usually takes some kind of external stimulus for those thoughts to present themselves as a coherent, concrete idea. This was one of those times. I was raised in New Orleans ... I just had the misfortune to be living in other places.

Caveat: I don't know about #7. But then, I've never actually met a pit bull.

getting there

Kaylee: how come you don't care where you're going?
Book: 'cos how you get there is the worthier part. [1]

I have a 45 minute commute to work in the morning. At 4am I pretty much sail through the countryside, since I'm only sharing the road with the occasional semi truck or raccoon. But on the way home, there's a decent amount of traffic, and on a two-lane highway with a lot of curves, it's hard to pass the people who are afraid to even go 55mph (which is the actual speed limit). Because it's a country road and it's generally acceptable to be going somewhere between 60-65, getting stuck behind these drivers is incredibly frustrating. And most of the time, there's really nothing to be done. You're stuck going 50 mph behind a line of seven cars, and that's just how it's going to be.

On the bright side, a lot of driving time also equals a lot of thinking time. It occurs to me, while I'm hot and tired and impatient with people, that I'm still moving forward, one way or another, and there's more to the journey than just getting to your destination. I think about this in three-lane traffic too, when there's a mass of cars all moving the same speed, and merging around each other into different lanes. Aside from the fact that it's pretty fascinating that all those tons of metal are moving at high speeds as one general forward-moving group of people, there's also only so much that a person can do to get from Point A to Point B. Traffic might be going at 65 mph, and you might get up to 70 dodging around a car or two, but you're still going to get stuck behind more cars all going 65. You have three different lane options, but you still have to be aware of the people and the world around you. You can't just skip ahead to the place you're headed for--you have to pay attention to what's right in front of you. And in the end, it might take a little longer than you'd like to get where you're going, but you're still going to get there.

Am I the only crazy person finding some profundity in this?

The thing about life is... you just have to keep living it. Sometimes it sucks. Sometimes it's awesome. Sometimes you don't know how you're going to making through the day and sometimes you never want the day to end. But the world is still turning and eventually your body will make you sleep and if you want to keep taking care of yourself (let alone anyone else in your life) you'll have to wake up, and eat, and go to work, and so on.

And some days, I hate it. Some days I'm bored and I'm frustrated with my surroundings, and I just want to pass the car in front of me and move on to the next part of my life.

When I discovered Ecclesiastes 3 a couple of years ago, I was shocked at how directly it applied to my thought process. It's not that the rest of the Bible doesn't apply to me, but the first 13 verses of Ecclesiastes speak to my heart in a way that few passages do.

For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven. (Ecc 3:1)

There is a time for everything. I believe in a God whose design for our lives is greater than our emotions. I believe in a God whose love is greater than my sadness. Or my boredom, for that matter. I believe we're all in the neverending process of learning and of growing, and as such, we're in the neverending process of moving forward. Because things still change. They have to. We have birthdays, go to school, get jobs--heck, we wake up and do stuff and go to sleep, just because it's what we're made to do. We create relationships with people who are also moving forward, and then we learn and grow from them, and sometimes they stay with us and sometimes they don't. Summer will turn into fall eventually, and then to winter, and then next year will be here and I will be remarking on how quickly the last year seemed to pass by. Life is more or less a string of moments, one after another, cause-and-effect, and every moment (whether it's made up of seconds or weeks or years) is affected by the past and changes the future. (see here for some nerdiness in regards to the Greek word for "season").

The point is, if I spent my whole life skipping from one momentous event to the next, I would miss all the life in between. And the thing about life is that it's not always fun or beautiful. Sometimes it's stupid or stressful or miserable. Sometimes it's just plain boring. Plus, by the way, it's impossible for me to actually skip the "boring" parts of my life. But fortunately I'm still moving forward, by necessity of the laws of nature, and everything changes. And what's more, everything changes in its own time (which is to say, everything changes on God's time, and not mine). My destination never changes--I know where I'll end up, and every day I'm another step closer--but for the present, I have to pay attention to my surroundings. And chances are good that something can be learned from those surroundings, even if it's as simple a thing as patience.

---

[1] from Serenity, the pilot episode of Firefly

active procrastiblogging

I desperately need new glasses.

I have re-superglued the crack on the left side about 11 times, and I am not kidding about this. The lens doesn't even fit into the frames the right way because the glue is in the way. I have found my current frames online and I could theoretically order them, if I can find a place that will a) take my insurance and b) use the frames I bought somewhere else. Or I could just go get new glasses like a normal person. But that would require, you know, taking the initiative to make an appointment and picking out new frames and everything.

I also registered for the GRE. Finally. And the date is coming up quickly--August the first, in case you were wondering--and I need to study for it. And I have some free study materials from on-the-lines, and a friend of mine gave my family a study book to borrow to read. I have not been able to pick it up from my mom's yet, but at least I can use it. Some day.

And while I'm in the process of studying, I want to be actually applying for school, since most deadlines are December-ish and I'm hoping to get it out of the way and off my chest. And also that applying early makes me look eager and enthusiastic (although realistically that probably doesn't matter). Applying means creating a CV, which is like a glorified resume from what I can tell, and also writing a statement of purpose. And that statement of purpose should be a piece of fluffywonderful angel food cake, because for goodness sake I've wanted to do this for years now and the hardest part of writing it should be keeping it between 300 and 500 words.

And I am avoiding all of this SO. HARD.

I still am not entirely sure why. I really and truly want to do all of these things. In my free thinking time I daydream about being back in school, about ~learning~ and about being a TA and then about teaching my very own Comp classes. I want to write my memoir (says the 23-year-old) and write my novel(s) and start translating Greek again. I want to use all this free summertime, because all I do right now is work.

Well. Work and stress about things that I need to do, instead of actually doing any of them. For goodness sake I spend more time writing about how I never write than I do actually... writing.

I have always had a problem with deadline-less projects. If there's no last minute, it just never gets done. So practically speaking, I will be studying for the GRE m a y b e two nights before the test, and definitely the day before. And I'll still feel like I'm winging it (which I will probably be doing anyway, but what can you do). I probably won't apply until December 6 (and the deadline for UWMad is Dec 8). I will probably have the mad scramble amid plenty of other plans and every time someone asks about the status of my application I will kick myself for not being on top of it.

But I don't want to DO those things. And I don't know how to fix them. I find reasons to excuse my lack of motivation--I don't have a desk, so I feel disorganized. I'm afraid of getting a bad test score, or of not getting into the school I want, so I put it off to defend myself from rejection. My early-to-bed work schedule makes it hard for me to focus because I'm worried about getting home and getting sleep (because I'm worried about falling asleep on my drive in to work). The excuses are endless. And they are all just excuses, and I know better.

I just don't know how to fix it. I am honestly starting to wonder if something is wrong with my brain, because I don't really think I have this weak of character that I can't just sit down and DO something. I also have anxiety about the passing of time, and then somehow I tend to use it stupidly even while I am angsting about needing to be productive. I feel disconnected and lost because the only person I am accountable to, really, is myself. And that's not a good enough reason to get shit done.

Let's skip past the self-esteem/emotional baggage part (I've been through that) and move right along to, "Piera, for the love of chocolate, you are 23 and out of college and married and living life mostly like an adult. It's time to grow the heck up and deal with yourself and your life and stop whining about this nonsense."

Or maybe I should be looking up local counselors because I have weird anxiety problems and it's affecting me in bizarre writer's-block-y ways.

I like neither one of these answers.