Posted by Elizabeth

When I heard that Elizabeth Gilbert had written a new book, I was nervous.  I wasn’t sure I wanted to read Committed, which picks up where Eat Pray Love leaves off, chronicling her difficult decision to marry Felipe, the man she literally sails off into the sunset with at the end of the story.  There was no way this book could ever live up to EPL, for I am one of those women – and I know there are many of us – for whom EPL changed my life.  Although Maikael and I had already been toying with the idea of taking eight months out of our life to embark on a journey of self-discovery around the world, EPL sealed the deal for me.  Inspired by her tale, we even spent two weeks lapping up life and culture in Ubud, Bali, which she details in such a mesmerizing way.  For me, Gilbert’s prose captured what I was feeling but was unable to put into words at that time in my life, feelings about being caught between a conventional and unconventional life, about being unsure what I wanted from life, about not knowing who I was or what made me happy in the slightest.  As different as our lives were – I was ten years her junior and not considering divorce – I identified with Liz Gilbert.

But I know not everyone felt this way.  When my former bookclub read Eat Pray Love, our group was fiercely divided by equal amounts of adoration and dislike of the book.  Some felt her journey was trite, her head inflated, her love story too tidy and saccharine.  Other just simply didn’t “get it,” which was unfathomable to me, who had found such connection and solace in the book.  As I traveled around the globe, the subject of the book often came up in conversations with fellow explorers (it really was a worldwide phenomenon), and, even amongst the highly self-selecting group of long-term travelers, the division of opinions was just as acute.  Love it or hate it, the book clearly made people feel something.

However, when I learned that Elizabeth Gilbert was coming to town – and that $35 could buy me two tickets and a hardback copy of the book – I was Committed.  So last Wednesday night, me and 500 fellow Liz Gilbert fans, including my former therapist, filed into an expansive ballroom at the University of New Mexico, which was stuffed to the gills with conference seating and estrogen.  The audience was one loud hum, buzzing with the anticipation of a cultural icon about to speak.  But a loud hush fell over the room as soon as Elizabeth Gilbert stepped to the stage, a flowy grey cardigan draped over her thin frame, her tousled blond hair pulled away from her face in a messy twist, a genuine smile etched on her face.

For the next 30 minutes she talked about the process of writing Committed, which represents the fruits of her second attempt to write a follow-up book to EPL. She spent two years writing a 500-page manuscript…and then threw the entire thing away. As she spoke these words, I’m pretty sure I heard myself groan audibly.  I’ve never written anything 500 pages in length, but I’ve written something a tenth of the size, and even throwing that away is vomit-inducing.  Gilbert discussed how difficult it was to ditch the manuscript, one in which she had received a considerable advance from her publisher and who, after two years of work, was soon expecting a publishable book.  “But the book was horrible,” she said.  “It wasn’t ‘me.’  It wasn’t written in my voice.  It was written in the voice of who I thought I should be after the success of Eat Pray Love.”  Her best bet, she reasoned, was to take six months off to figure out the follow-up book she was meant to write.  In the meantime she gardened.  And one day, with her fingers dug hard into the soft earth, a single sentence – the sentence that was to become the opening line to the book – simply came to her.

Late one afternoon in the summer of 2006, I found myself in a small village in northern Vietnam, sitting around a sooty kitchen fire with a number of local women whose language I did not speak, trying to ask them questions about marriage.

From there she “took the sentence for a walk across the page,” and proceeded to pen Committed in a mere two months.

While not all of us have the luxury of time or literary advances, as I sat in that overheated ballroom, surrounded by a sea of like-minded New Mexicans, it dawned me on me what a powerful lesson her process presented for living a life in pencil.   There is nothing more important in this life than learning to be YOU – whoever you are.  In fact, is it even something we should have to learn? If we are skilled and equipped to be anything, it’s to be ourselves.  And yet, how difficult it can be to discover and then speak our voice, whether we are writers or not.  It shouldn’t be easier to be someone else, but that is often the case.  Borrowing someone else’s tastes, pleasures, preferences, and aversions is a simple game of mimicry; to truly face who we are, and not who we think we should be, is a lifelong project.

When we are living a life that isn’t attuned to who we are, it’s been my experience that things take forever to manifest themselves.  Everything feels like a Sisyphean task, making it difficult to differentiate between sheer hard work towards a difficult goal and being engaged in the “wrong” thing.  The difference, I think, is that when we are living a life attuned to who we are, things come more easily, more quickly.  While there are bumps in the road, setbacks, and hard uphill battles, the effort feels purposeful.  We feel a deep sense that, while the path is bumpy, it’s the right path to be traveling down.  No amount of construction can reshape the wrong path.

While we talk often here at Life in Pencil about making changes within the parameters of our existing lives, Gilbert’s story teaches us that sometimes life requires us to start over.  If a plan is born from a place that doesn’t feel true or authentic, no amount of “editing” is going to make it right.  Sometimes, major revisions are required.  Sometimes, we have to throw the baby out with the bathwater.  Sometimes, we have to start from scratch.  When Gilbert threw away that first draft, without another story idea in sight, she was facing a problem that needed to be solved, a puzzle of the highest order.  “A puzzle,” she said, “is just a crisis with the volume knob turned down.”  But rather than panicking, she trusted that time – and a vegetable garden – would eventually bring order to the puzzle.  “Problems are like cheap underwear,” a Buddhist monk friend once told her.  “Eventually they wear themselves out.”

And it’s true, isn’t it?  Over time, even the most pernicious problems wear themselves dull and raw, until we genuinely wonder what we were ever worried about in the first place.  Such was the case with Gilbert’s book, and such may be the case with any dilemma, crisis, or life change that you might be facing.  Sometimes, the best thing we can do is take a break and trust that the process will work itself out.  I have always believed that the only way out is through.  Whether we are talking about a failed book project, a career crisis, or a relationship gone awry, there is no easy shortcut or “work around” (as my computer programming husband would say).  We need those seemingly impossible puzzles, those failed attempts, to push us through to the other side.

Just last week I was cleaning out my office, and I discovered a draft of the first essay I had ever written nearly six years ago.  Back then, I was a graduate student in counseling psychology, and a career in writing was the furthest thing from my mind.  And yet, much like Elizabeth Gilbert, I was drying my hair one morning before school when a single line popped into my head.  I immediately scrambled to write it down, and proceeded to skip my morning classes – which I never did – to write an entire essay, which tumbled forth from that one line.  I wasn’t sure where this line had come from, or where it was going, but two years later I submitted that essay to a local writers’ conference.  I remember feeling very proud of my effort, a reflection of the best I could produce at the time.  But reading this essay six years later, while there are lines that are still gems, it struck me that it just wasn’t very good!  The ideas are there, but the execution is sloppy, amateur.  It dawned on me how much I have grown as a writer in that time span, but how necessary it was to write those first stumbling drafts on my way through to becoming a writer.  And when I read this post in another six years, I’m sure I’ll be struck by the same thought.

Gilbert’s friend, an artist, often reminds her, “The creative product is the unidentical twin of the dream you had in your head.”  In other words, what we produce while pursuing the creative process – be it writing a book, baking a pie, or even living life itself – is often a flawed copy of the perfect image we held in our head when we conceived the idea.  It seems to me that the purpose isn’t to create a facsimile but to simply chase after that image to the best of our abilities.  Whatever we produce will never be as perfect as we’d hoped.  But with time and experience, I think our image and the real thing grow closer together.  Just like Gilbert’s book, this blog, as imperfect as it is, couldn’t exist without that first humble essay.  And whatever goal you are working towards in your life couldn’t be accomplished without whatever fumbling efforts you are making right now.

Are you a fan of Eat, Pray, Love (or not)? Have you read Committed?  What lessons do you take away from Gilbert’s process that I have missed?  Do you think that sometimes starting over is the best thing?

Posted by Elizabeth

I just finished reading The Happiness Project (book #5 since The Waiting Game started last month!), Gretchen Rubin’s account of one year spent trying to lead a happier life.  What struck me about the book is that, when she begins her experiment, she’s already a fairly happy person.  And yet, there is something wanting in her life.  But rather than starting her life over from scratch through drastic and dramatic measures, she concludes that she’d like to implement change within the context of the life she already leads…which is basically what we here at Life in Pencil espouse!  Given that Rubin’s book is currently ranked #2 on the New York Times’ Hardcover Nonfiction Bestsellers’ List, this tells me that a lot of people feel this way:  their lives are pretty good, although not all they want it to be, but starting over from scratch (if that’s even possible) either isn’t an option or very appealing.

Throughout the book, I was surprised to discover that Rubin persistently mentions bluebirds (even the cover art features a little bluebird winging its way over New York City).  As I’ve mentioned before, bluebirds represent a powerful symbol in my life; in a sense, they’ve been with me all along.  When I was five, my mother registered me for an art class, wherein we created giant masks fashioned from chicken wire and papier mache that slipped over our head.  Where I got the idea to create a bluebird is beyond me, but for years that massive mask, which I slathered with electric blue paint, sat at the top of my closet, gathering dust but unable to be thrown out.  At some point my mother started gifting me bluebird tokens and trinkets – again, why or when that started baffles me – which I’ve continued to be drawn to my entire life.  My Christmas tree is literally filled with bluebirds.  I often see bluebirds in nature – even in places where the birds aren’t known to nest.

Once somebody asked me, “But what do the bluebirds mean?”  I honestly had no idea, but after pondering the question for awhile, I responded, “I’ve always taken it to mean that I’m on the right path.  It’s a symbol of reassurance.  When I see a bluebird, I know that whatever I’m doing in my life at that time is the right thing.  If I’m considering some sort of change and a bluebird wings its way into my life, I feel good moving forward.”  As I was nervously finishing up a writing project last fall, silently wondering to myself where it might lead and if it was worth my time and trouble, I suddenly looked up to see a fat bluebird perched on the wall of my courtyard, staring intently at me.  I took this as a very good sign.

On one hand, Rubin’s use of the bluebird is not surprising.  Bluebirds have long been associated with happiness (we’ve all heard of “The Bluebird of Happiness”).  On the other hand, when Rubin decides to start a collection and chooses bluebirds, I couldn’t help but feel a little spooked out, for I have never met another soul who felt as drawn to bluebirds as I have (they’re not exactly kittens or cows or any of the other ubiquitous animals that people tend to collect).  However, I got the sense that Rubin selected the symbol for its significance more than being genuinely drawn to it.  The thing about “spirit animals” is that you don’t choose them; they choose you. If you pause for a moment, I bet you can think of certain animals that consistently seem to make their way into your life, who you feel an unusual connection to.  These animals – what they symbolize – have something to teach you about yourself, about the choices you’re facing, about the life you’re trying to lead.  Last week, Kristen from Motherese wrote about woodpeckers, making elegant connections between their behaviors and being a writer.  I encouraged her to do some reading on the bird, because I bet there’s something she needs to learn about herself as a writer that’s revealed through them (just as I enjoy diagnosing people with existential crises, so, too, do I like to assign people spirit animals).  Over the past few weeks, usually-timid roadrunners have made a happy home in my yard, literally waiting for me by the front gate (which, coincidentally, is blue); I probably should do some reading on them, too.

I’ve always wondered about the origin of “The Bluebird of Happiness,” and Rubin gratefully answered the question for me.  The earliest mention was in a 1908 play called The Blue Bird, and the plot goes like this:  two kids go in chase of happiness, guided by a bluebird around the globe.  When they return home, they find the bluebird waiting for them.  “We chased you all around the world, and here you are, right where we started!” they exclaim.  “Happiness is right where you are, not something you need to go in search of,” replied the bluebird.   The hairs on the back of my arms stood at attention as I swallowed these words, for if there is one lesson I’ve have spent my life trying to learn, it’s to be content with wherever I am in my life.  Perhaps that is what the bluebirds have been trying to teach me all along.

What animals are you naturally attracted to in your life?  What do you think they are there to teach you?  Do you think making an already happy life happier is a worthy goal; or, do you think we have to start from scratch to enact any meaningful change?

This Sunday’s New York Times Book Review featured a great article on the recent surge in happiness-related books (including one called Bluebird!).  And, if you’re interested in reading more about your “power animal,” or discovering what your power animal might be, I highly recommend Ted Andrews’ Animal Speak.

One final note:  I had no idea what an uproar my Groundhog Day post would cause!  Apparently, I was under the (false) assumption that everyone hated the Bill Murray/Andie McDowell movie as much as I did.  To quell the fire, I am offering this YouTube video from LiP Reader Meghan, featuring her nephew Zach and his eloquent thoughts on Groundhog Day (the holiday, not the movie).  Enjoy!

I’m not sure if you’re aware of this, but there are people out there who actually don’t read fiction.  People who enjoy non-fiction more than novels.  Can you imagine?

Okay, so maybe this is not a news-flash to you.  And of course, I’m jesting to an extent.  I’m actually keenly aware of the anti-fiction reader.  I’m aware because my husband is one of these people.  And this post today springs from a conversation we had over dinner recently—well, an “unreasonably heated debate” might be more accurate.  It went something like this…

Anne:  “I’m curious—why is it that you don’t ever read novels?”

Husband: “Well, they’re not real.  Why bother?”

Husband (still calmly amused):  “Isn’t that the definition of ‘real’?”

Anne (voice raising):  “Well, a novel can possess TRUTH without being factual.  The essence of what it teaches—what it communicates—doesn’t change because it didn’t actually happen in real life.”  

Husband (possibly reaching a greater level of intensity):  “I don’t know…I like a great story, but I love knowing that it happened. I find that more inspiring than just wondering if it happened.” 

(Disclaimer:  If you’re wondering if our dinner conversations are always this deep, I have to assure you…no.  Just the other day we devoted a substantial amount of time to discussing what our dog Murry might say if he could talk.)

Bursting with truth...

Several days after that conversation, I still find myself wondering why on earth I should feel so eager to defend the novel.  Or why I should be so dumbfounded by my husband’s reaction.  Sure, I’ve read plenty of non-fiction books—with some I’ve even found myself engrossed in the pages, and eager to learn.  But it’s the truth behind the fact that pulls me in.  Not the facts themselves. 

Judging by my reaction to this our friendly debate, I have to admit and conclude that fiction plays a massive role in my life.  I find this both totally normal, and slightly disturbing.  On the one hand, it’s harmless.  I love to lose myself in other worlds, other times, other stories.  What’s wrong with curling up in a chair, and bursting with anticipation (and caffeine) as I lovingly open the binding into a new and fascinating (albeit fictitious) world?  What’s wrong with experiencing sadness—true sadness—when a perfectly woven tale reaches its end?  Nothing…I don’t think.  But then I wonder…

Why is it that I learn through characters?  I’m comforted through characters.  I even aspire to the same qualities as characters.  Shouldn’t I feel more inspired by reality than fiction?  What am I more invested in the actions of the imaginary?  So often, I wonder how beneficial it is to pursue a Life in Pencil, when so much of that life is inspired by people, events, and stories that don’t exist.  Stories that are literally a collection of pencil strokes (or keystrokes) in someone else’s imagination. 

But I always return to my original argument—my original thesis.  Fiction works for me.  It speaks to me.  And stories shape me…showing me how to erase one piece of my life and re-write another.  These characters of mine mold me and encourage me to develop new qualities, and to craft my own story.  And the meaning I take away from my favorite stories continues to shift and change as I allow my own life to shift and change as well…in pencil.  In the end, fiction shapes me because it carries grains of truth.  And for me?  That truth is just as “valid” as biographies, memoirs, or historical accounts.  Fact or fiction, I’m looking for truth. 

Are you a novel junkie like myself, or a lover of non-fiction?  Or are you so well-rounded that you read both equally?

Posted by Elizabeth

If I had to assign one word to my life these days, it would be this:

Waiting.

I can’t tell you what I’m waiting on.  Not just yet.  But suffice it to say that I’m playing The Waiting Game, a game I absolutely hate playing.  All of us play The Waiting Game at one time or another, and from what I’ve observed, some of us are much better at it than others.  As I’ve written before, I am a terribly impatient person, and since waiting and patience go hand in hand, I’m not very good at waiting, either.  I envy those who are able to take waiting with a grain of salt, focusing their minds on present concerns while the future waits (patiently) in the wings.  Normally fairly skilled at attending to what’s right in front of me, everything I’ve learned about living a life in pencil flies out the door when it comes to waiting.  Instead of moving through my life with zen-like flow, the days run dark and slow as molasses.  Instead of enjoying the freedom of idle time, I find myself nervous and antsy, watching the hands on the clock sluggishly drag themselves around the dial.  I’m not using my time:  I’m killing it, biding it, filling it.  The funny thing is, it’s these periods of waiting that have the most to teach us about life in pencil, but it’s also the times in which these lessons become most difficult to learn.

The best way I know how to play The Waiting Game is by throwing myself into a good book, because nothing makes the hours slip by quicker.  Needless to say, I’ve read more books in the past few weeks than I read in the second half of 2009.  I recently finished Jeannette Walls’ Half Broke Horses, her follow-up book to The Glass Castle, one of my all-time favorite books and memoirs.  Described as a “true-life novel,” Half Broke Horses sets the stage for The Glass Castle, providing the backstory to Walls’ topsy-turvy childhood by relaying the life story of her maternal grandmother, Lily Casey Smith, an incredibly adventurous woman who led an incredibly adventurous life.  During a time when women’s occupational aspirations where limited to secretary, nurse, or schoolteacher, Smith found employment as a mustang breaker, ranch wife, maid, bootlegger, poker player, racehorse rider, bush pilot — and a schoolteacher (though not all at once).  If I could pick a Life in Pencil posterchild for this insufferable period of waiting, Lily Casey Smith would be it.  Here’s what I learned about living life in pencil from Lily Casey Smith – even in the midst of my own waiting, when the lessons are so difficult to learn:

1. When one door closes a window opens – but it’s your job to find the window. A nun at the Sisters of Loretto in Santa Fe, NM, gives teenage Lily this advice when her dad loses the money for her final year of school tuition, which would have enabled her to graduate and realize her dream of becoming a schoolteacher.  There are many ways to get to where you’re going; if you want it bad enough, keep searching for the window. 

2. When a plan stops working, do something else.  Most people stay in losing situations far too long. During the Depression, Lily gets into the bootleg business to make ends meet.  Business is booming until someone she refuses to sell liquor to reports her to the sheriff, and she narrowly escapes arrest.  Even though she’s desperate for the money, she realizes the opportunity has run its course and it’s time to get out the bootleg business.  It’s always difficult to walk away from “sure things,” even when they cease to become the “sure thing” we’ve always considered it to be. 

3. Always be scanning the environment for opportunities, looking ahead, anticipating.  Although she’s from a family of horse people, she learns to drive a car when she can see that automobiles are the future of transportation.  When everyone is selling their cattle during the Depression, Lily and her husband buy extra heads for their ranch at bargain-basement prices, knowing things will eventually turn around.  Sometimes living in the future can be a good thing.

4. Doggedly pursue anything that really matters to you, even if it takes a lifetime to achieve it. Many years and miles down the road, Lily eventually realizes her dream of becoming a teacher.  It doesn’t happen in any conventional way – she works as an itinerant schoolteacher in some of the most poor, rural communities in the West and works her way piecemeal through high school and college in order to earn her teaching certificate.  But she experiences a boatload of adventures along her unusual path.

5. Balance mystery and excitement with pragmatism. While Lily’s life is colored with risk-taking, dramatic episodes, and close brushes with danger, she maintains a surprising degree of level-headed coolness.  She is a calculated risk-taker, with an intimate sense of which risks are worth taking and which ones aren’t.  She is skilled at determining when the risks outweigh the benefits, and when it’s worth jumping in head first and seeing what happens.

And I can tell you this:  Lily Casey Smith was an exceedingly patient person.  She waited half of her lifetime to become a teacher, and didn’t spend a lot of time moaning about it in the meantime.  She pursued other adventures while she waited for her window of opportunity, because half the battle of living a life in pencil is waiting for the timing to be right.

Are you patient or impatient when it comes to waiting?  How do you handle The Waiting Game?  What sorts of things get your mind off whatever you’re waiting for?

Posted by Elizabeth

This week I’ve been reading Mennonite in a Little Black Dress, a fantastic memoir by Rhoda Janzen about her experiences growing up in a Mennonite family, leaving the faith, and eventually returning to her roots after tragedy touches her life. Over the course of a truly terribly year, Janzen experiences a botched hysterectomy, her husband leaves her for Bob from Gay.com and, six days later, she’s in a devastating car accident that leaves her with serious injuries.  Where else is there to go but home?

Aside from being a bitterly funny read about Ms. Janzen’s experiences as a 44 year-old woman returning to live at home with her parents, at its heart it’s a book about change.  Namely, what do we do when life throws an onslaught of unwelcome changes in our path?  And can forward movement really be accomplished by going back?  If you want to learn something about resiliency and forgiveness, necessary ingredients in the process of change, read this book, because Janzen is a picture of both.

During her time at home with her parents, Janzen reconnects with a childhood friend, a woman with whom she shares a great deal in common but whose life took a completely different path.  Janzen chose the secular path to academia, while her friend, Eva, becomes a Mennonite scholar.  Janzen leads a cosmopolitan life sans children; sensible Eva is a small-town mother of two.  And yet, at their core they are so similar that each woman sees how her own life could have easily turned out like the other’s.  In the wake of a dinner at Eva’s house, Janzen ponders the following:

I sometimes ask my college students if they think it’s possible for a thirty-plus adult to experience saltatory ideological change.  I tell them that I’m not talking about the kind of gradual mellowing that results from age.  Nor do I mean the kind of abrupt character fissure that opens in the wake of trauma or suffering.  Rather, I want to know what they think about the possibility of a profound, lasting change that emerges from an act of deliberated, conscious self-determination.  I want to know if they think we can change our core assumptions about what we believe.  About how we believe. Yes, say my students. Absolutely!  Of course we can change! And then I marvel at their hope.  My students carry optimism around in their backpacks like bright bottles of designer water.

Saltatory. I admit, I had to look up the word in the dictionary (MS Word didn’t recognize it either, and kept insisting I change the word to “salutatory”).  According to Merriam-Webster, the definition is “proceeding by leaps rather than gradual transitions.”  And this definition made me chuckle a little, because when Anne and I talk about our differing approaches to change, this is often how we couch it:  I make sweeping changes, and Anne makes small adjustments.  In fact, I’m grateful to have a single, concise word that perfectly captures how I face change, and I plan to use it as often as humanely possible.  And although my changes tend to be saltatory, I often find myself posing the same questions that Janzen does.  Is real self-imposed change possible? I know this is a question I’ve posed here before, but I’d like to look at it from a different angle.  From the angle of happiness.

When I was younger, everything seemed possible.  There was nothing so permanent in my life that couldn’t be changed.  All of the structures, the scaffolding, that held my up my little world were precariously temporary.  I liked it that way, because it meant that anything could be torn down and rebuilt at any time.  I had so much faith in saltatory change.  As I’ve matured, while the lure of dramatic change is still there, I find myself less enamored with it.  I find myself working harder to make the most of my circumstances rather than change those circumstances, perhaps because I know, deep down, that the attachments I’ve made mean that my life is more or less fixed in a certain constellation.  By virtue of making certain choices, I’ve eliminated others.  This dawning realization isn’t sad or hopeless or depressing for me.  It just means a new phase of life where happiness doesn’t necessarily equal saltatory change – a stage I couldn’t have predicted when I was a college student in my late teens.  Because as the happiness research says, we’re terrible at predicting what will make us happy in the future because we’re bound by what we think we will make us happy today.  And as a 20-something, the things I thought would have made me happy at 31 are far different than the things that really make me happy.

So is it possible to change our core beliefs at any age?  Sure it is.  But I think, at this stage, we’re more likely to feel the pull of making the most of what our life is – unless life-altering circumstances force us otherwise – because, for most of us, saltatory change isn’t what it once was.

Answer the question that Janzen posed to her college students:  is it possible for a thirty-plus adult to experience saltatory ideological change?  Are we happier accepting our lot in life or struggling against it (or something in between)?

In other news, our friends, Emily and Jennifer, at Mothers of Brothers were nominated as one of the Top 50 Mommy Bloggers by Babble.com.  As they say at the Oscars, it’s an honor just to be nominated, right ladies?  But I’d love to see them win, so if you support their great blog, vote for them here.

Today we continue our Holiday Season Extravaganza.  Between now and December 25, we will share what it means to celebrate the holidays — Life in Pencil style.

Posted by Anne

The book that launched an afternoon.

One of my favorite holiday decorations has always been…the book.  Each year when my Mom hauled out the usual decorations—candles, nutcrackers, etc—she also pulled her favorite seasonally appropriate books off the shelf.  During the holidays, A Christmas Carol in its leather-bound glory would sit in a place of honor on the coffee table, along with Twas the Night Before Christmas.  But there was one other book…a poem…that Mom set out to read.  It’s called A Cup of Christmas Tea, and my Mom just adored it.  It tells the story of a busy modern woman who must go visit an elderly friend (or was it a relative?) for a “cup of Christmas tea”…hence the title.  And despite the woman’s reluctance, it’s a wonderfully touching tea party.  She finds herself slowing down, and learning something new.  It’s a lovely poem, soaked in estrogen and filled with holiday cheer. 

Now, as I kid, I didn’t find this poem particularly thrilling.  Even though I wanted desperately to attend tea parties (and magically become English), I still preferred that other poem about St. Nick clattering around on someone’s rooftop.  But this old poem of my Mom’s must have rubbed off on me, because this year, in a moment of holiday inspiration, I asked a neighbor of mine over for a cup of tea to celebrate the holidays.  I wouldn’t exactly call her “elderly”, but she’s certainly not a peer, either.  She’s someone who often wants to chat, but in the break-neck speed of my weekly schedule, I rarely allow a word in edge-wise.  This was my chance to redeem myself…my Christmas gift to her.     

So this past Saturday, I gathered together my tea party…determined to make the whole affair decidedly cheerful and elegant.  As it turns out, my neighbor doesn’t like tea (or coffee).  Hmmm, not to worry.  I decided to make cookies and some kind of punch.  As it turns out, she doesn’t eat sugar.  Hmmm….my fantasy tea party was tanking by the minute.  I called my Mom—the expert at feeding and entertaining senior women, and asked her what to do.  “Well, hon, obviously you serve some savory snacks and wine or sparkling water.”  Oh, Mom.  Brilliant that woman.    

My holiday spread.

And so I did just that.  I laid my coffee table with the prettiest water I could find, and arranged cheese straws, crostini, and spreads.  I used platters and pitchers we received for our wedding—the stuff that people always think is too formal for everyday (but shouldn’t be). My guest arrived on time, bearing a gorgeous poinsettia and sugar-free cider.  We sipped the cider, and munched on the snacks.  We covered everything from marriage to travel to real estate.  She told me stories.  I told her stories.  I learned about the origins of the town I’ve called home for over a year now.  We talked, and kept talking…for somewhere in the neighborhood of a couple hours or more.

It was lovely because it was slow.  It was an afternoon “in pencil”.  And for all the chaos of the holidays, it felt so warm…so civilized…and even a little old-fashioned.  I had nowhere else to be, and nothing else to do.  I was present with her—enjoying the company of someone I otherwise never would have taken the time to appreciate.  And ultimately, I was glad I’d done something other than bake her banana bread, and stick it on her porch.  She loved my conversation a great deal more.  (And apparently doesn’t eat sugar).  So as it turns out, my Mom’s poem was spot-on.  I hope you all have the opportunity to take an “afternoon off” this holiday season, and find someone—young or old—with whom you can share a drink, and simply talk. 

Any holiday books that have ever inspired you?  Do you ever find a moment to slow down during the holidays?

Posted by Elizabeth

I have a dream.  Not a Martin Luther King kind of dream, or a nighttime vision, but a blurry image that’s still being born.  It’s a dream I’ve been groping around for in the dark for years, blinded by an uncertainty as to how to achieve it.

I want to lead a more simple life.

Maybe it’s a silly dream, a naïve dream, an obvious dream:  who doesn’t want to invite more simplicity into their life?  I’ve made attempts at a simpler life in the recent past, doing the things that I thought would lead me down that path.  Spent less money, cleared the social calendar, watched less TV.  But I still feel like I’m drowning, that my mind and my life are so muddled that I often can’t discern what’s really important.  My desire isn’t to approach simple living in a way that is precious or perfunctory, which is easy to do.  Simplicity, as it turns out, is surprisingly complex, but our impulse is to reduce it down to sound bites, tidy self-help books, and themed magazines with articles that tout 20 Easy Suppers in 20 Minutes!, which doesn’t even begin to dig at the complicated heart of simple living.  My intuition tells me that choosing to live more simply requires an ever-vigilant eye towards finding the beauty in the mundane as an everyday practice.  Like most kinds of meaningful changes in life, simple living isn’t a series of tasks but a way of life.  And it’s a way of life, at least in our culture, that we’re not easily indoctrinated into.  Rather than caring for and tending to the life placed before us, we strive for more in every aspect of our public and private spheres.  We revere the unique, the special, the extraordinary, which is always “out there,” something to be attained and chased after.  I want to stop searching for the good life, and wake up to the good life that is already here, right in front of me – if only I wasn’t blind enough to see it.

I picked up Katrina Kenison’s The Gift of an Ordinary Day: A Mother’s Memoir on a whim, unsure if “a mother’s memoir” had anything to offer a childless woman.  As it turns out, the book had as much to do with one woman’s quest to seek out the simple life as it did with her experiences as a mother of teenage boys.  I found myself swept up in a whirlwind of inspiration, completely captured by her story of physical and spiritual transformation.  I was surprised to discover myself wiping away tears more than once, whispering to myself, This is what I want. As I read the book, I felt a fire lit beneath me, and I realized that what I’m really searching for is a way to make the ordinary extraordinary, for my everyday life to be imbued with meaning and ritual.  And perhaps more importantly, I want to write about the gloriously pedestrian experiences in the same way Kenison does, who makes the simple act of holding a cup of tea at the kitchen window as riveting as anything I’ve ever read.  Her writing captures the essence of simple living:  beautiful, fascinating, and surprisingly complex.

My challenge, of course, is that I’m unsure as to how to begin this journey towards a more simple life, and even more uncertain as to how to write about.  I found myself propped on my sofa Thursday afternoon, nearing the end of the book, ready to spring to action but unsure what my first step should be.  But if I learned anything from Kenison about beginning to live more simply, it is to attend to the ordinary tasks and details of life with a certain spirit of reverence and mindfulness, for it is here where grace resides.  I decided to start with cleaning my laundry room, which might strike you as a particularly unceremonious place to begin a life-altering journey.  But of all the rooms in my house, this one has received the least amount of my attention in the five years I’ve lived here.  It seemed like a fitting place to begin.

The laundry room is a narrow, pokey space, a room I spend as little time in as possible.  When I first moved into the house, after having been a 10-year resident of apartments and other communal living situations, I marveled at the novelty of a room dedicated to managing one’s dirty clothing.  The closest I had ever come to my own laundry room was a flimsy hallway closet in my graduate school apartment, whose doors rattled and shimmied and did an excellent impression of a jumbo jet taking off when the spin cycle was in process.  It didn’t help that the doors had to remain propped open, for to close them meant creating a Florida Everglades environment, hot, humid, and swampy.  Now I had an entire room whose door I could close!

At first I meticulously maintained the space, an altar to domesticity, carefully storing the spindly drying rack as soon as the clothes were dried to make way for the ironing board, whose profile perfectly fit the lanky space.  I marveled that someone had the foresight to thoughtfully install a plug at eye level in the center of the room, perfect for ironing.  As months fed into years, I did what I always do when the everyday no longer provides novelty:  I took the room for granted.  The drying rack stood upright for weeks at a time, the ironing board competing for space.  I haphazardly stuffed the cabinets with cleaning supplies and entirely too many bags of dust rags fashioned from discarded clothing, which emanated a stale, musty odor.  Each time I opened the cabinet door over the washing machine the iron’s licorice cord snaked down into my line of sight, which I carelessly stuffed back into cabinet.  The laundry room became a dumping ground for the things I couldn’t deal with:  drop cloths for unfinished painting projects, pants that needed a button sewn on, light bulbs, candles, phone books, flashlights.  It was easy to close the door and forget it existed.

On Thursday afternoon I cut through layers of dust, sending swirls of gray powder into the air.  I vacuum behind the washer and dryer, remembering how excited we were to receive them as a Christmas gift six years ago, my mother-in-law having snipped a photo of the appliances in two, stuffing one half in my stocking and the other half in Maikael’s.  I discover a shelf whose top layer has been munched upon by a bottle of bleach that spilled long ago.  I realize I never change the light bulbs because they are too far out of reach, and that I can’t be bothered by mopping because the bucket is always filled with old rags.  I don’t replace buttons because the sewing kit is stored somewhere in the bowels of the cabinets, an explosion of needle and thread.  I hate cleaning the house because the room is so chaotic that it’s simply too much trouble to scavenge for cleansers and sponges.  I realize that the state of this laundry room reflects my entire approach to life:  out of sight, out of mind.  Who has time to clean a laundry room when life has so many exciting things to offer just beyond my front door?  It is clear, though, that all these small neglects had added up to one big headache.  If I want to start living simply, I need to start with the small things that require my attention right below my nose.  If I can’t manage what’s already present in my life, how can I even think about doing more, having more, being more, and wanting more?

Standing back to admire my handiwork three hours later, I am overcome by an unusual sense of satisfaction.  I snap open the cabinets to gaze upon the neatly lined shelves.  The floors, freshly mopped, smell pungently of a Christmas tree.  I call Maikael in to appreciate the evenly stacked towels.  It is not the perfection that delights me, but the care and attention that I’ve given to a small corner of my world.  Through my actions, I have made this humble, neglected room worth something.

Posted by Elizabeth

You know you need more stimulation in your life when you return from Michaels incensed that the line didn’t progress in a certain matter.  Then you recount the tale in excruciating detail to your husband when he returns home from work, giving the boring fascinating blow by blow.  Normally one to get passionately swept up in intellectual ideas and debates, the greatest kerfuffle I’ve recently experienced is what I should do with the head of cabbage I received from my CSA.  Clearly, there hasn’t been much worth getting fired up about lately.  And I was so deeply entrenched in checking my Facebook status that I nearly missed Barbara Ehrenreich’s interview on The Daily Show. Author of Nickel and Dimed, her newest book is Bright-Sided:  How the Relentless Promotion of Positive Thinking Has Undermined America. From the first words out her mouth, I could tell this was something worthy of getting fired up about (at least, more worthy than demeaning line protocol).

Barbara Ehrenreich on The Daily Show

The primary thesis of Ehrenreich’s book (which, admittedly, I have not yet read) is that America is suffering from a full-blown delusion of positive thinking.  I couldn’t agree – and disagree – more. Like Ehrenreich, I’ve grown weary of the saccharine “you can do it!” attitude that seems to permeate every aspect of modern American life.  We sometimes focus so intently on staying positive that we fail to see the darker aspects of life; and we need both the dark and the light to see the many shades of gray that invariably reflect the complexities of the human experience.  I’ve often found myself in situations where I’ve shared a deeply emotional issue or concern – a problem for which I am seeking not sympathy or encouragement, but simply a kind and quiet heart – and the knee-jerk response of the listener is often some variation of, “Stay positive!”  We have learned, as a culture, to operate from this stance of blind positivism, so as not to really hear what others are saying.  If I have learned anything from my experiences as a counselor, as well as a fellow human being and friend, it is to let someone share something difficult without trying to provide a tidy answer or upbeat aphorism.  Otherwise, we are escaping our responsibilities as listeners of the human experience by rushing through to the other side of the conversation, evading complexity and stepping into our more culturally-comfortable role as speaker.

But within this movement Ehrenreich also lumps in what I believe is a separate topic altogether; that of positive thinking.  She scoffs at the field positive psychology (incidentally, an official division of the American Psychological Association), alluding to it as a “pseudo-science.”  She equates positive thinking to a form of magical thinking, defining it, in her interview, as a belief that “you can control things with your thoughts.”  This seems to be oversimplifying the matter.  Positive thinking in and of itself won’t bring about change, but I’ve always believed in the maxim that, “Luck favors the prepared.”  It’s not enough to sit around and wait for good things to happen; we must continue working and striving and putting forth effort towards our desired goals and directions.  But when positive thinking is coupled with this effort, I’ve personally witnessed the amazing things can happen.  And that isn’t a delusion.

Now that the proverbial blood is pumping, I will do the counselor thing, the thing that, no matter how far I move away from the profession, will always be with me.  Why does this topic get me so worked up?  Why was I was sitting on the edge of my red chenille couch, precariously balancing the computer on my lap, Facebook long forgotten, as I yelled at the television screen?  It’s always difficult to be faced with a situation that calls into question your way of life, your way of thinking, your entire orientation to the world.   I’ve never been a cock-eyed optimist; I’ve always felt a certain amount of angst in my life, and can be as cynical as the next person.  But I rely a great deal on positive thinking.  I rely on hope and optimism, the belief that tomorrow is a new day, that things will get better.  I rely on my effort eventually being met with my positive intention to manifest the life I want to live.  To turn against positive thinking is to turn against hope itself.  Isn’t it possible to adopt a more nuanced understanding of positive thinking, where we can be positive without being saccharine or one-dimensional?  I think we can.

Where do you fall on the continuum of positive thinking?  Do you agree or disagree with Ehrenreich’s ideas?  Can you think of examples when positive thought, coupled with hard work, has manifested something incredible in your life?

Posted by Anne

Just a small chunk of my collection of heroes and heroines.

When you hear the term “role model”, it’s usually in the following context:  “You know, young women today need positive role models like Michelle Obama, instead of Lindsey Lohan.”  Indeed…how true.  But here’s my question:  Does a role model need to be, by definition, older than oneself?  I hope not.  And furthermore, is it a prerequisite that role models be actual people—people who live in the flesh, and appear on CNN?  Again, I hope not. 

I hope my role models can be young, and I hope they can be fictional.  There’s a simple reason:  Lately, the people I aspire to emulate are…well…little girls from books.  Long since the day I first turned the pages of a “chapter book,” I’ve been hooked on children’s literature.  I love an adult novel as much as the next reader, but every so often, I need something different.  I need the pure, entertaining storytelling of a child’s novel.  But most of all, I need the characters.  I need to feel inspired.  And I’m sorry—Anne of Green Gables somehow inspires me worlds beyond the “modern-day-woman.” 

The favorite books of my childhood (and let’s face it, adulthood as well) are the ones that tell the stories of girls I admire—girls who try new things, take risks, make changes, and touch the lives of other people.  And when I think of Life in Pencil, I think of these beautiful, spunky, sassy, genius gals.  They are my role models.  Here’s why…

Hermione Granger, Harry Potter Series
Oh, Hermione.  I relate to her on so many levels…mostly her nerdy propensity for answering questions in class, and how she’s always so tickled to shop for school supplies in Diagon Alley.  But as much as I share her teacher’s pet persona, I don’t always share her most important quality—bravery.  She may be anxious when it comes to exams, but her anxiety seems to melt away at exactly the moment when danger lurks.  Man, she’s cool.

Mary Lennox, The Secret Garden
Okay, so she’s not the cheeriest of girls in the beginning.  But can you blame her?  Cholera, creepy Yorkshire mansions, and aloof hunchbacks?  It’s gotta be tough.  But ultimately, she finds solace and joy—through quirky people, fresh air, and a very secret old garden.  She steps outside of herself, and embraces a part that she never knew existed.  She’s brave—she dares to leave the bitterness behind, and move forward. 

These are the girls I wish I could be.  No, you won’t find me hiding at the local art museum, and I regret to say I’m a horrible gardener.  But I will continue to strive for the LiP qualities these girls represent…adventure, wisdom, and the courage to change. 

Any fictional role models in your life?  Or do you stick to the traditional definition? Or just tell me your favorite children’s novel…if I haven’t already read it, I will.