what can happen in a year

In taking a look at my old posts from more than a year ago, I had forgotten that Zora Neale Hurston's quote had been on my mind at the turn into 2011. I'd also forgotten that C. S. Lewis poem about Addison's Walk.

It turns out, 2011 was a year of more questions. And the summer did not come true (at least, not in the way the Addison Walk bird insinuated).

2011, in brief, looked something like this:

• February: Learn that we were moving from my home (a 2-story + basement house) to a 1,000-sq ft apartment in another state. 
• April: Return for spring break to discover all my childhood memories for sale in basically any available room on the first floor. If we'd sold our books from K-5th grade for just $2 each, we would've had over $400. I remembered every single book.
• June-July: Take a summer chemistry course in which I was the only liberal arts major. After class, apartment-hunt all day. Homework all night. Find refuge in my home church and re-establishing friendships there.
• July: PACK. and also, paint the new apartment. 
• August: MOVING DAY. Live in an apartment full of unpacked boxes, with no furniture and a family that doesn't even get along when we have our own rooms. We fell apart. Return to school totally broken.
• September - December: Literary Criticism & Theory consumed my life. At least, any part of it that hadn't succumbed to deep depression. After 3 years of loss, my body gave out. Stopped eating, speaking, caring. Friends forced me to meals & counseling. Around December, I finally started to get better. 

2012, in short, has been a year of healing. If you'd told me a year ago that by this time I would have started to get better, feel happy again, and find a place that feels like home, I would've laughed at you. Or stared blankly past you and rolled back to stare at the wall. 

But God had other plans. He placed people & events in my life to pull me back up. He did not leave me alone. He is a God of healing, restoration, and love. 

Hopefully, in the next few weeks, I'll be able to process some of that and put it to words.

0108—123: summer nights & back to school

This is the week that I realized…I’m leaving for school soon.  I am looking forward to being back, to seeing my friends, getting to know my new roommate, taking challenging classes, and getting more involved in extracurriculars.  At the same time, it feels like I just got home.  And I will miss my family a lot in the weeks that I am away.
Even so, God is providing many blessings and happy memories in this time of packing and preparation:
0108:  God's peace & glory in a thunderstorm.
0109:  A few hours in a book store.
0110:  Self-control to not buy anything from the book store.
0111:  Recognizing when I am on the fast train to Burn Out
0112:  & subsequent peace about taking a lighter course load.
0113:  No damage during many thunderstorms.
0114:  A week of just mom & sister.
0115:  Dad's safe return.
0116:  Skyping with the my freshman roommate (& much laughter)

0117:  Provision to buy the clothes I need for school
0118:  Shopping is no longer a self-esteem-breaking ordeal. 
0119:  $180 coat for $38. 
0120:  An evening at the fair with my younger sister.
0121:  First funnel cake ever.  Sooo good.
0122:  A long talk walking up & down the carnival street.
0123:  Out of distress into jubilant psalm, Jesus, I come to Thee…

my dad sings like perry como

Saturday morning sunlight streamed through lace curtains as a 5-year-old early riser stretched and blinked the sleep from her eyes.  Instantly she heard singing - loud, wake-the-whole-house baritone singing.  That only meant one thing:  Dad was cooking breakfast that morning, and he was happy.  As she got closer, the girl, realized he was singing a love song to her mom: "Some enchanted eeveniinngg, you will see a straaangeeerr.  You will see a straangeerr across a crowded rooomm.  And somehow you'll knooww, you'll know even theenn, that somewhere you'll see her again and aaaggaaaiiiinnn..."

The 5 year old giggled.  Mom glowed.  

Later that afternoon: "Daddy, how did you and mom fall in looooovee?" 
"We didn't, Laura.  We stepped deliberately into it."

"Oh," disappointedly.  "Well that's no fun."  

"That's what you think."

~*~

I never get tired of my parents' incredible love story - how he wasn't really looking, but they met at work and my mom suggested lunch (or something).  How 4 months later my mom bought a simple dress at a department store (which still fits!), and they married in a small chapel with a few family and friends, and that was that - their married life began.  He provided, and she paid the bills, and he kept the house running when migraines hit, and they raised 2 girls and made each other laugh.

It's been 20 years, and still sometimes I catch them slow-dancing in the kitchen as dinner cooks.  

Happy 20^th anniversary, mom & dad.