Proud Mama Elizabeth labored all day on Labor Day.  Congrats to Elizabeth and Maikael!

And Life in Pencil is back in a few short weeks!

Happy Friday, readers.  If you follow this blog, you’re probably aware that life is about to change in momentous and special ways for our Elizabeth during the month of September.  We decided it only appropriate to take a blogging “maternity leave” of sorts for the next 4 weeks.  We’ll miss your comments, your insight, and your responses.  But rest assured, we’ll be back in October with new stories, new observations, and new Life in Pencil moments.   And if you’re curious, here’s what we’ll be up to…

Elizabeth:

“While I won’t be writing about life in pencil during the next four weeks, I will be intensely focused on living life in pencil. As the website slumbers I will be learning how to take on the challenges of motherhood, one day at a time. Not only will I be learning the logistics of my new life, from mastering midnight feedings to gaining competency in the art of diaper changing (it’s true: I’ve never changed a diaper), I will be learning the less tangible aspects of stepping into a new role.  Cultivating a new identity takes time and energy, and I want to give my full attention to the important work of mothering that lies ahead. I want to savor these early days as I get to know my daughter, to fully absorb the lessons that she has to teach me. When I return in October, I hope to share my insights – hopefully deepened – about what it means to live life in pencil. Until then, I wish all of our dear readers a month filled with their own growth and development, no matter how big or how small.”

Anne:

“It probably goes without saying, but my September will look quite a bit different than Elizabeth’s.  Nonetheless, it feels an important time for me to take a step back, and channel my energy into some new experiences, and exciting challenges.  September marks the start of the school year—a time I move at full throttle.  Students return.  I train my staff.  There are ‘welcome picnics’, and a welcome coolness in the air.  And this year—for the first time in a few years—I’ll add teaching back to my professional life.  This is an experience I’ve been wanting, and for which I’m now discovering some pent-up nerves.  I’ll attempt to wade through those nerves, and all the feelings of incompetence.  And I’ll ride the rush of excitement I find when standing in front of a classroom, hoping to connect with college minds.  Wish me luck.”

See you in October!

I have trust issues.  Not issues with trusting people, mind you.  I’m easily trusting of people—maybe even too trusting.  I consider myself fairly trusty as well.  But trusting a process?  Trusting that life or my heart’s desire will work itself out?  I’m a big giant skeptic…hence my difficulty with life in pencil. Despite a very good life, I tend to question whether the future will give me what I want.   I doubt my future.  Stress over it.  So it’s a good thing other people believe in me.  People like…my sister, Gale.

Without the constant reality check of people like Gale, life would be one big old anxiety-fest.  When I want someone to confirm that my doubts and insecurities are unfounded and exaggerated, she’s happy to oblige.  She knocks the optimism back into me.

This was never truer than on a leisurely, sisterly afternoon in my mid-to-late 20’s.  I was single and convinced I would never find someone.  Never marry.  Never be in love…or at least requited love. (Yeah, I was totally dramatic about it.)  We were shopping together, and Gale wanted to hop inside the jewelry store to get her ring cleaned.  “Let’s play!” she said.  We tried on rings “for fun.”  This was not fun for me.  And after a few, I started to lose it.  I would never have one of these, so why on earth were we there?  We left the store, and poor Gale was left to interpret my drama-rama reaction through my flood of tears.  I don’t even remember what she said that day to comfort me.  All I remember was what she did a few months later.

She’d been out of town on business.  Not long after her return, she stopped by my apartment.  “I have a present for you,” she said.  “But it’s conditional.”  She went on.  “This is to remind you that you never need a man to give you jewelry.  If you want jewelry, you can have it.”  And she handed me a small, silk pouch.  Choked up, I loosened the drawstring, and emptied the contents of the pouch into my open palm.  A perfect string of pearls.

She wasn’t saying, “You’d better get used to buying your own jewelry.”  And she wasn’t saying, “Suck it up.”  In reality, she never doubted for a moment that I’d find someone to love.  But to her, there was no reason to go putting my own pleasure on hold until that day came.  The sensible thing is to just live and to live well.  The rest will come.

Hopeful and pragmatic.  Optimistic and grounded.  That is my sister.  Comforting to have someone who believes my life will work out just fine…despite my doubts, despite my fears.

Do you have someone in your life who can convince you things will work out even when your self-doubt is overwhelming?

“Deep within my body, the past is still alive.  Everything that has ever happened keeps happening.” Devotion by Dani Shapiro

In order to rewrite our lives, we have to possess a deep understanding of how they were written in the first place.  Inspired by this post at A Design So Vast, which was adapted from this writing exercise, I bring to you my version of “Where I’m From.”

I am from the seafoam house stuffed to the gills with stuff, from towering stacks of aging National Geographic magazines and a junk drawer whose crusty bottom never saw the light of day.

I am from the place with an impossibly steep staircase lined with fuzzy gold shag, and chipped linoleum in the kitchen perfect for an indoor roller rink.

I am from the fuchsia rhododendrons peeking over the front window, delicate trilliums on the backyard “nature trail” that dad carved out one year.

I am from Friday Night Party Night, crouched in front of a tiny black and white screen, gobbling Hershey’s Miniatures and watching Sha-Na-Na.

I am from a long line of women – strong, risk-taking, and independent – each a mirror image of the other, from our squinty eyes to the crinkly bridge of our nose to our laugh with reckless abandon.

I am from thrift and practicality:  always buy a white car!

From “be careful what you wish for” and “follow your bliss.”

I am from faith without churches, spirit without God, an eclectic smorgasbord of beliefs from all around the globe.

I’m from the deep, cool shade of evergreen forests, from warm tartans and a feathery headdress, from dessert after every meal and silver shrimp forks.

From watery camping trips on the shores of Puget Sound with floating tents, and aquatic creatures who spent even the chilliest of Pacific Northwest summers caked with sand and salt.

I am from a musty warehouse sheltering decaying boxes of fading photographs.  There is no family home, no communal gathering place.  But the memories I treasure most I carry with me, right where they belong, making my home wherever I go.

Where are you from?

For whatever reason, I have had a hard time jumping on the Twitter bandwagon.  As an extrovert who loves to dish and rehash the details of my life, Twitters seems like it should be right up my alley.  Facebook certainly is.  So it was with interest that I read Peggy Orenstein’s article “I Tweet Therefore I Am” in The New York Times Magazine, in which she argues that the advent of social networking media has turned us from an internally-focused culture to an externally-focused one in which “your psychology becomes a performance.”  (As someone with both a theatre and psychology background, I find this fascinating.)  Not long after stumbling upon Orenstein’s piece I read Katrina Kenison’s blog post “The Swallows,” in which she mulls over many of the same questions and quandaries that Orenstein poses.  Namely, that in our efforts to record our attempts to live in the moment, do we cease to live in the moment?  She notes the irony by saying, “I earn my living by writing about being in the moment.  And I do so by sitting in front of my laptop, typing words onto a screen.”

When I think about what it means to live my life “in pencil,” one of the first things that springs to mind is living a life that is intentional and conscious, one in which I am both engaged in the day-to-day happenings of the world around me while taking time to reflect upon how those happenings are effecting me.  And the method in which I typically choose to reflect is through writing via online media.  “But,” in the words of Orenstein, “when every thought is externalized, what becomes of insight?”  I can’t help wonder what I’m missing in my everyday life via the process of writing about my everyday life.  I wonder if there are other ways that I could be reflecting upon my experiences without writing about them.

Oh, and the fact that I’m sending out this post via Twitter?  The irony isn’t lost on me.

What do you think:  does conveying your experience take you out of the moment or help deepen the experience?  What other ways can we reflect upon our lives without making them a “psychological performance?”  Are you a Twitter fan?

What makes a relationship tick?  The recipe for romantic bliss is one of our country’s favorite topics, and it doesn’t take a PhD to agree on some basic elements like respect, emotional intimacy, and love.  But what else?  How do you infuse spice and energy into even the most comfortable of relationships?  Says one relationship theory…adrenaline. 

The theory—backed-up by research—is pretty simple:  say you’re in an adrenaline-spiking situation with a loved one.  The arousal we experience from that burst of adrenaline spills over, and we attribute some of that arousal to the person we’re with.  Thus, in the right circumstance, adrenaline begets romantic passion.  

This rickety bridge is as close as I get to an adrenaline rush...courtesy of trip to Chile last year.

The first time I read this particular theory, I panicked. You see, I’m not a fan of adrenaline.  I’m sure it’s very useful and all in life-threatening situations.  But on an everyday basis, I don’t go seeking ways to be in touch with said adrenaline.  Does this mean my marriage is doomed?  I don’t think so. 

In my view, the intimacy gained from a shared experience need not be risky.  Every time my husband and I approach a new experience, the outcome is unknown to us.  Life in Pencil is often required.  So even though our adventures aren’t particularly high-risk, they are still adventures.  We…

-Travel
-Hike
-Fish
-Camp
-Eat in funky small-town restaurants

And in recalling these experiences, I feel happy, tingly, and closer to my husband than ever. 

So if sky-diving, bungee-jumping, and rock climbing are your things, go for it.  My recipe for relationship bliss?  Simply sharing experiences for which I can’t predict an outcome.  Bonding through the shared experience of low-risk adventure. 

Do you bond with your significant other through experiences, or more routine pastimes?  Are you a fan of feeling that adrenaline rush, and if so, does it make you feel more amorous than usual?

Growing up, Sundays were special.  It wasn’t because we went to church, because we didn’t, but my family observed the Sabbath in our own way.  Sunday was the only day of the week that my mother didn’t work, so, desperate for a rest, the activity of the seventh day usually orbited around home and hearth.  Although it didn’t happen like clockwork, more times than not my mother made a special dinner, whipping up a dish that required the kind of tending that only hours at home could provide.   Pot roast would cozy us next to rustic apple crisp, steaming up the kitchen windows on a cold winter’s day.  Cool slices of banana cream pie – my dad’s favorite – would be dished up in the warm summer months.  These were not fancy, complicated meals served on our best, chipped china; rather, they were an everyday centerpiece to our small family of three being in one place, at one time, one day of the week.

As my thoughts turn towards my own soon-to-be family of three, I’ve become interested in resurrecting this particular version of the Sabbath; one that has not religious meaning but a personally spiritual one.  And it seems as if I’m not the only one concerned with rewriting what it means to take a day of rest.  Over the last year, I’ve noticed the publication of books like Judith Shulevitz’s The Sabbath World and Dani Shapiro’s spiritual memoir Devotion. I’ve dipped in and out of the blog A Year (or More) of Shabbats, tracing one family’s journey to share Friday night Shabbat dinners with friends.  Just last week, The New York Times featured an article (also by Shulevitz), Creating Sabbath Peace Amid the Noise, which highlights the different ways in which people are adapting ancient Sabbath rituals for modern times, from eating a special meal to forgoing shopping and disconnecting from technology.  Taken as a whole, I can’t help but think that, as a culture, we are itching to bring more quiet, more meaning, and more connection into our everyday lives.

Sometimes I let my mind run wild with visions of the small Sabbath feasts that I will make tradition in my expanding family.  Home-cooked meals will be served on the delicate Noritake china that my mother-in-law gifted me.  We will toast to the clink of the Waterford crystal goblets that were passed down from my parents.  We will sit around the stately cherry dining room table that was my grandparents’, swallowed whole by candlelight.  And this will happen every Sunday, without fail.  But just as soon as I create this gauzy vision it is withered by reality.  Once again, my imagination has set me up to fail, and I’ve missed the point completely.  As I think about rewriting my relationship to Sunday, I’d be smart to pay attention to two pieces of wisdom from Shulevitz’s article:
1.  “Sometimes doing things halfway is exactly what we need to do.”
2.  “The second you write down the rules, it doesn’t work.”

In other words, like living Life in Pencil itself, we’d be wise to create our own version of the Sabbath in a way that works for us, and to keep rewriting it as our lives change.  Traditions are wonderful, but we’re more likely to maintain them if we take a flexible approach.  As I reflect on the Sabbaths of my childhood, the shards of memories that glimmer from the corners of my mind are those of good food, quiet, and togetherness; you don’t need any elaborate ritual to do that.

Are you as enamored as I am with this idea of the modern day Sabbath? Do you have a Sabbath day ritual, secular or non-secular?  What ideas do you have for creating or maintaining a day of rest?  I encourage you to read Shulevitz’s New York Times article; it is short, but instructive.

Is there any season that lends itself to Life in Pencil as well as summertime?  Methinks not.  The long days, brilliant sunshine, and lazy spirit of the season seem ripe for Life in Pencil moments.  For example…

Lazy rivers, and resting on the bank:

Al Fresco, all the time:

Incredible ingredients make for minimal culinary planning:

And tiny tastings to wash it all down:

Camping trips with lazy puppies:

Sitting on the back patio with not-so-lazy hydrangeas:

And on vacation…one very slow sunset that made me forget anything and everything on my schedule. 

Happy Friday, all.  And Happy Summer.

What images would appear in your summer photo album?

I stand at the arrivals gate, part of a pulsing mob waiting for the same thing:  the first glimpse at a blond head bobbing through the crowd, a peek at an orange shirt, a broad smile of recognition.  My best friend, Heidi, has flown in from Las Vegas just to throw me a baby shower.  We spend Friday madly dashing around, taking care of last-minute details.  I arrange to have our feet perfectly manicured for the big day.  I drive us to the old-fashioned candy store where I choose Holland mints in pale shades of spring, stuffed into wicker booties that my mother-in-law sent from Mexico.  Have you called the tearoom to give them the final head count? I call to her through the bathroom door.  Try as I may, I can’t help but micromanage the details of a party for which I am the guest of honor.

When Saturday afternoon rolls around, I tick the items off my to-do list and pack the car with pretty packages as Heidi irons out the wrinkles of her salmon blouse and runs from room to room with a hair clip in her hand.  One moment I see her furtively scribbling at a card, the next she is wondering where her camera went.  Are you ready? I yell to her from the garage.  Almost!, she shouts.  If humans had calls, these would be ours.

At the tearoom, we are a flurry of hugs and hellos.  In between introductions I catch Heidi’s eye.  Can we get into the room early to place the favors on the table?  It looks like we’re missing someone.  Where’s the herbal tea? Once seated, she wrestles the camera out of my hand and the gifts I am balancing on my lap and insists that I do nothing for the next two hours.  Soon I fall into a steady rhythm of simple pleasure, munching on treats, chatting with friends, tearing into wrapping paper.  Before I know it the chimes tinkle gently, letting us know in the most civil way possible that our time is up and a spell is about to be broken.

After a leisurely breakfast the next day, crammed with deep conversation, Heidi gets ready to fly home.  Minutes before we need to leave for the airport she is slowly, carefully penning a list of the gifts I received for the baby’s book on beautiful blue paper. I flutter nervously around her, asking her what snack she’d like for the plane, if she’s remembered to pack everything, if she’d like a copy of a recipe.  Without answering, she continues her meticulous writing, her focus laser sharp.  I finally cram a triangle of homemade blueberry pie into a Tupperware container, calling Are you ready?, from the kitchen.  Almost.

Racing to the airport, less than an hour before her departure time, Heidi says to me, “I never worry when I’m around you, because I know you’re doing enough worrying for the both of us.”  While I dash around this world with pen clutched firmly in palm, Heidi is flowing through life with an eraser.  Whenever I am in her presence, she reminds me to let go, to have fun, to live my life in pencil.  She reminds me that a perfect sheet of paper that will live forever in a memory book is more important than being a few minutes early to the airport.  She is my ultimate counter-weight, the one who helps me craft my world through moments, not lists and details.  She reminds me of how far I have yet to go on this journey.

Who’s your “counter-weight?”  Whose simple presence reminds you to live your life “in pencil?”  Do you have a hard time letting go of the details of life?

I believe that sometimes—to live a fulfilled life—some planning is necessary.  Take, for example, your family relationships.  If your extended family is anything like mine, individuals are scattered across the country…perhaps even different continents.  While my nuclear family is small and contained, my extended family has always been another story.  Both sides of my family live from one coast to the other, making a Life in Pencil spontaneous family gathering unlikely at best.  And yet, this never stopped my parents.  Come hell, high water, or gridlock traffic on I-40, my sister and I were going to know our family—all of it—no matter how obscure the relationships.

Throughout my childhood, adolescence, and college years, we connected with our family.  We attended weddings and reunions from Kentucky to New Mexico to Berkeley to San Diego to Nebraska.  We detoured from our intimate family vacations to spend the night with cousins in Colorado.  We ate homemade pie in the dining room of my great aunt’s pillared home in rural Tennessee with no air conditioning—in the height of summer.  Why?  Because how else would I know and appreciate my cousins—my family—once I reached adulthood?  My parents wanted to foster these relationships. They knew they had to make it work.    

As an adult, I have a much greater understanding of the effort this took.  My parents planned, communicated with distant relatives, and racked up miles upon miles of highway time.  It was often a grind, and I’d venture a guess that those trips felt very UN- Life in Pencil.  But the result has been more meaningful than I could have imagined, and has created a sort of delayed Life in Pencil gratification.  Here’s what it accomplished: 

To this day, I will erase and rewrite my schedule, reroute my flights, arise at ungodly hours, and take unplanned vacation days if it means an opportunity to connect with family.  Recently, when my dear aunt asked if she could come for an impromptu visit to the Northwest this summer, I didn’t hesitate.  Somehow, when it comes to family, I rise the Life in Pencil occasion. 

And as a result, I not only have family connections all over this country, I have friends.  A week ago, I left for a conference in San Francisco.  A metro ride, a shuttle, and a rental car later, I was spending the 4^th of July with a nearby cousin and his beautiful family.  This was a relationship forged through effort and inconvenience, and it’s become incredibly important to me.   

When I have my own children someday, I hope I’ll share my own family with the family I love, no matter how I have to rewrite my plans. 

Are you willing to erase your plans for family?  Friends?  Did your parents drag you all over the country as a kid?  And do you do the same with yours?