Posted by Anne

No, this post is not about Tom Cruise. He creeps me out.

No, not the movie.  (Sorry I misled you with that picture.)  I’m talking about a different kind of risky business…the professional kind.  The kind that makes us gaze in admiration, and wonder if we’ll ever have the chance (or the guts) to pursue the proverbial “dream”.   We see these stories all the time—people who chuck their “safe” careers, and dramatically switch directions…usually resulting in some very lucky inspiring and artistic professional success.  Sometimes these brave souls even do so at the risk of losing a paycheck, or worse yet, health benefits.  But they go forth.  They say, “So long, law!”  They shout, “Hasta la Vista, Marketing!”  They make it happen.  They become writers, comedians, bakers, and actors.  They take risks.  They follow their passion.  There is both risk and passion.  And so I ask you…

Does Passion = Risk?  Or perhaps more accurately, does passion necessitate risk?

Awhile back, Gale from TenDollarThoughts contributed this guest-post, asking a very similar question.  I think it’s worth revisiting.  First off?  Let’s tackle the word “passion”.  I hear this word quite a bit in a given week.  Enter the sweet, naïve, and slightly bemused freshman.  I ask what brings him or her into my office.  They say—at age 18—“Well, I was hoping you could help me find my career passion.”  Riiight.  Let me get on that.   

Actually, I think these students are sweet.  I shouldn’t judge.  After all, I was one of them about a decade ago.  But this word “passion” gets bandied about so much, I wonder if any of us know what the heck we’re talking about awhen we use it.  Generally speaking, people are “passionate” about activities—pursuits—that they find both interesting and fulfilling.  So…why aren’t we all working careers that embody our “passion”?  A few theories…

1.  Discovering your “passion” is hard.  It’s not something you’re born with.  It’s not something that you discover in a tidy package when you’re ready to declare a college major.  It’s something you have to search for, wait for, and for which you need oodles of life experience.  It’s elusive, this passion thing.  You may have more than one passion.  And it may not come to you with clashing symbols and Oprah-esque inspiration.  But do look for it.   

2.   You’ve discovered your passion, and frankly you aren’t that skilled at it.  Recently, I gave a presentation on careers and passion for a group of students attending a weekend leadership conference.  The student organizers had chosen a video clip for us to watch.  The clip was Wanda Sykes, describing how and why she left a perfectly safe and respectable career to pursue comedy.  As she spoke about taking risks, following dreams, and ditching healthcare for a few years while she got her start, I watched the students around me.  They laughed, smiled, and felt inspired.  And so did I.  But as they reacted to the video and discussed the importance of passion, one lone voice spoke up from the back.  “What if you’re not any good at the thing you’re passionate about?”  Yes, there’s the rub.  What if Wanda Sykes wasn’t funny?  Generally speaking, I think we tend to be passionate about things for which we have at least some skill.  I don’t find a great deal of joy in, say, gardening…probably because I tend to kill plants.  Go figure.  But this student’s point was well-taken.  When the expectation is to make your passion financially viable, we raise the stakes quite a bit. 

3.  You’re unwilling to take the risk.  I asked these same students—“Is it possible to follow your passion with taking some amount of risk?”  Many of them said…no.  Perhaps it’s because we assume someone’s “passion” must be something artistic—abstract—unstable.  And so the option seems to become “either-or”.  And actually, I don’t particularly like this line of thinking.  It says to me…if you like to cook, but don’t want to open your own restaurant/bakery/catering business, then you’re out of luck.  Keep it as a hobby.  And while hobbies are fine, I have to believe there’s a middle ground—a place where we can use our passions and pursue our dreams in a slightly less dramatic fashion.  The writer who writes for their job, for example.  But you know me…I’m a change-phobe. 

I don’t have an answer for this “risk and passion” question, just as I didn’t have an answer for those students who looked at me expectantly—waiting to see if I’d illuminate how they could enjoy a “passionate” and a likewise safe existence.  If you’re working in some capacity that uses your “passion”…good for you.  And if you’re not?  I’m not sure I think it’s because you’re an inherently un-risky person.  Maybe you are.  But maybe that opportunity to blend work and passion just hasn’t found you yet.  Maybe you’re still grappling your way through discovering your passion.  It takes time.  Roll with it.  If it’s time to take a risk, I believe you’ll know.

Okay, readers…does passion necessitate risk?  And how many of you a) know what the heck your “passion(s)” is/are?  And b) Do you get to incorporate your passion into your work?  And c) Do you feel like you had to take a big risk to do so? 

Also, if you’ve got the time and want to check it out, here’s the clip the students selected for the presentation.  Enjoy!

Posted by Anne

Elizabeth and I have written many letters to each other over the past 5 years.  Many.  Each is special, and each is distinct.  But every so often, there are letters—stories—that stand out from the others.  Elizabeth’s favorite has always been my “Stink Burger Letter”, which she referenced back in August.  We’ve received at least one request for the Stink Burger story (thank you Kitchen Witch!), and since it’s an apropos story for Life in Pencil, I will indulge (or bore) you.  Enjoy.  

Once upon a time, I decided to get my PhD.  And deep into my doctoral education, I temporarily burned out.  I was tired.  Weary.  Done.  Confused.  And so I did what any privileged 20-something would do.  I went on a road trip—alone—on a self proclaimed “summer of self-discovery and relaxation”.  My journey took me coast to coast, and along the way, I landed in Flagstaff, Arizona.  This was to be my home-base for some important activities.  In typical Anne fashion, I had it all planned:  1) Hike in Grand Canyon, 2) Fly-fish in Grand Canyon, 3) Gain insight about my purpose in this world while doing said activities.  Good list, right? 

I made it through my Grand Canyon hike.  I’ll spare you the details, as I know you’re more concerned about the Stink Burger situation.  Suffice to say that the hike was beautiful, dusty, lonely, and hot as hell.  So that evening, I did what any wise traveler would do when feeling physically exhausted and lonely.  I looked for a really good meal. 

Enter…the Stink Burger.  I got back to town, cleaned off the canyon dust, and headed to a nearby microbrewery.  The “Stink Burger” had come highly recommended, and I’m not one to argue with layers of meat, roasted garlic cloves (hence the name), and an onion ring piled high on a bun.  I settled into a beat-up wooden chair, and the waiter looked at me a little suspiciously, clearly wondering why this slightly sad-looking woman was alone…in a bar…ordering a big greasy burger.  I matched his gaze, and then I ordered that Stink Burger with confidence!  With gusto!  It arrived, and I was thrilled to tuck in, having truly earned my dose of saturated fat.  (Hiking + existential soul-searching burns tons of calories, in case you’re wondering.)  The hunks of garlic were soft and mild, and the onion ring was so perfect I considered ordering an entire side of them.  I wrote a letter to my sweetie (now my hubby), read a few pages of a book, and washed down that mighty stink burger with a malty brown ale.  I was feeling better already.  And then… 

The crippling food poisoning didn’t hit until the next morning, getting ready to head out for activity #2, fly-fishing.  And when it hit, it hit big.  There I was, a pitiful lonely traveler trapped in my room in an Arizona hostel, puking my guts out.  And let me tell you folks, a hostel is not the ideal location if you’re suffering the ramifications of a poorly cooked Stink Burger.  I kept hoofing it down the hall to the bathroom, where well-meaning, patchouli-scented hippies would stare at me, but never speak.  I must have looked odd to them—pale, unhappy, and lacking a guitar in my hand or a mellow smile on my face. 

I spent the next 24 hours face-down on my hostel mattress, listening to the sound of the train outside my window, and replayed the same question, over and over in my head.  What the hell am I doing here?  I wished I had a friend with me.  My boyfriend.  My sister.  ANYONE who knew me.  I thought I felt lonely at the rim of the Canyon.  Nope…this was loneliness.  Puking over a Stink Burger in a likewise stinky hostel. 

I tried to remember why I was taking this trip.  Something to do with feeling overwhelmed, growing weary of graduate school, and needing an escape.  And I guess I thought I needed to “escape” totally on my own.  I was only partially right.

That entire trip, I felt free, which was exactly how I wanted to feel.  But I’d never expected that freedom to feel so hollow.  Back at the canyon’s rim, I was surrounded by people…couples, families, and grandparents in embroidered t-shirts and awkward-looking baseball caps.  For that whole day, I stared at people.  At little kids delightfully licking ice cream cones.  At parents attempting to take pictures of their too-cool-for-canyon teenagers. And I stared at the canyon—surreal and massive. 

Did my “summer of self-discovery” accomplish what I had intended?  Well, yes and no.  I learned that as much as I love adventures and exploration, I had reached a point where I was very ready to share them with other people.  It was the beginning of my need to feel…you guessed it…settled.  And I learned something else.  In case you’re wondering, you can’t plan the contents of your own existential awakening.  And my Stink Burger was proof.  

The End. 

Ever gone on a trip to shake things up?  Discover yourself?  Any traveling misadventures to share? 

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

Dreamy, steamy, or creepy?

Confession:  I used to be a major American Idol fan. During the first six seasons, I never missed a single episode – and if you know the amount of hours that show occupies on the airwaves between January and May each year, you know that’s a major time commitment.  In fact, AI (that’s what real fans call it, you know: AI) was one of the first mutual passions/grotesque fascinations/guilty pleasures that Anne and I shared.  Our obsession reached a fever pitch in graduate school, AI providing a balm to our weary souls.  (Anne and I have a theory that the level of seriousness in your television programming has a direct, inverse correlation to the level of stress and anxiety in your daily work life.  Needless to say, graduate school was prime AI territory.)  I would call Anne during commercial breaks, and we’d recap what had just happened in the previous 15-minute segment, ogling Constantine Maroulis’ dreamy hair and hypnotic smile, while laughing hysterically at John Steven’s infamous falsetto version of Crocodile Rock.  When I moved away, our debriefs continued via letter, and we filled pages (yes, I admit, pages) predicting winners and losers and dissecting Kristy Lee Cook’s hoe-down version of Eight Days a Week.

But at some point along the way, we got a life lost interest.  Eventually, AI faded into the background, and I’d be hard-pressed to tell you much about anything that’s transpired the past three seasons.  When I returned from my ‘round-the-world trip last March, smack dab in the middle of season eight, everyone was talking about Adam Lambert, the rumored favorite.  Already feeling like a cultural pariah after eight months off the map, I decided to increase my pop culture IQ by tuning into a few episodes.  True to reports, Lambert was interesting and edgy (or at least as edgy as AI allows you to be), a strong singer and great performer to boot.  And, as is so often the case with the AI franchise, the best contestant doesn’t win, the winner fades into obscurity, and the runner-up shoots to meteoric fame.

Yesterday I was watching Oprah (what else is there to do when you’re playing The Waiting Game?), and the theme of the show was “Big Breaks,” featuring Susan Boyle and Adam Lambert.  To be honest, I wasn’t very interested in either guest, but, like I said, what else is there to do when you’re playing The Waiting Game?  But what followed was a surprisingly interesting interview with Mr. Lambert who, by my estimation, is an articulate young man with a solid head on his shoulders.  What interested me most about his story was how a musical theatre performer had managed to refashion himself as a glam rocker on American Idol without being accused of “selling out” or “not knowing himself” (for those uninitiated, AI judges LOVE to slap those labels on contestants)?

A few years ago, Lambert reported, he wanted to “make something happen” in his life.  He was bored, but unsure exactly how he wanted his life to be different – he didn’t have any specific goals he wanted to achieve or milestones to reach – but he was clear that he wanted it to change.  He began by simply asking The Universe to bring something new into his life.  For awhile he did nothing but think about the change.  In a process that he calls “positive projection,” he would imagine in his head how his life might be different.  “And then I took action,” he said, auditioning for American Idol on a whim, unsure if the show would respond to his “left-of-center” aesthetic and unusual background.  The rest, as they say, is history, but even Lambert concedes that how this dream manifested itself is far bigger than he ever believed it would be.

So what does all of this have to do with living life in pencil?  This is a very roundabout way to get at a very simple point:  big changes often have very humble beginnings.  Sometimes we feel we need something to be different in our life, but we’re unsure what that “something” is.  In our goal-oriented culture, where specific objectives hold more cache than vague urges, I think we often shy away from change unless we have something specific in mind that we want to be different.  When I worked as a career counselor, I sometimes caught myself falling into this pervasive mindset, telling my clients, for example, that it was fruitless to begin a job search until they knew what they were searching for.  But Adam Lambert’s story seems to suggest the contrary.  In his version of change, we need only be specific in our intention that we want things to be different somehow – defining what that change is isn’t part of the equation.  That’s the part we leave up to The Universe.  And isn’t there something liberating in that?  For many of us, we won’t make even the smallest nudge towards change until our goal is 100% clear.  But my fear is that we might get stuck waiting a lifetime.

The other key point of Lambert’s “model” is he met thinking with doing.  Just a few days ago I wrote about “doing something” versus “doing nothing” when you’re faced with an existential crisis – the kind of crisis Lambert faced just over a year ago.  Lambert’s life change came about through equal parts doing and being.  After he’d spent some time thinking about the changes, he knew that nothing would transpire without action on his part.  He didn’t know at the time if American Idol was the answer – it could easily not have been – but taking action kept him moving forward.  Most of us prefer being or doing, but that only brings us halfway there; clearly, Lambert shows us we need both.  But even a combination of being and doing won’t get us to our destination if our intention isn’t clear, pure, and true.  When pure intent meets a clear vision and strong action, The Universe provides in ways that are bigger than we ever could have imagined for ourselves.  All change, no matter how big or how small, begins with an intention, no matter how specific or vague.

Who says that American Idol is worthless – there’s obviously plenty of life lessons to be learned!  What have you learned about change, success, or risk-taking from American Idol, your favorite television programs, or other pop culture outlets?  Are you, or have you ever been, a huge American Idol fan? What do you think of Lambert’s “model” of change?  Don’t be hatin’ on pop culture, y’all!

Posted by Anne

Your first love--a pivotal marker, whether you like it or not:)

Your life is a story.  So says the latest issue of my pop-psychology guilty pleasure, Psychology Today. It’s difficult for me to perceive my life as such—stories are supposed to have neat timelines, climactic events, and resolution.  But it’s true.  Though messier than your typical novel, our lives are stories, with multiple inciting events, and countless examples of conflict, building action, and denouement.  And according to this article, we track our life stories by one important mechanism—the “firsts”.  The first love.  The first heartbreak.  The first victory.  These first-time experiences are life-markers—etched in our consciousness forever.  They serve as a reference point for our later endeavors, and affect our confidence and expectations.

As someone who struggles with focusing (way too intensely) on the future, I don’t often reflect on these “firsts”—these pivotal memories that form the backbone of my life’s narrative.  But they’re always there, appearing at the most unlikely of moments.  The memories startle me into reflection, and cause me to take a step backward in time.  Because no matter how many people I love, there will always be the first love.  No matter how many fish I catch, there will always be that first trout in the Rocky Mountains.  And no matter how many friends I make, there will always be that first “best friend” who made me giggle, and traded backpacks with me.

Despite my obsession preoccupation with the future, I think it’s important to note the firsts.  For what they teach us, and how they shape us.   Though they’re difficult to conjure on cue, these are a few that spring to mind…

My first straight-A report card. My 3^rd-grade teacher pulled me aside in our hallway, praising my achievement.  Amazing how that first piece of paper—to me a symbol of perfection—became a source of identity and paved the way for countless more A’s, crippling stress, and my greatest source of confidence–school.

The first time I felt self-conscious about my body. I was sitting on the bench, near the 4^th-grade section of the playground, and a boy told me my legs were big.  Only recently have I begun to love my legs for their strength and endurance.

The first time I had to break someone’s heart. The perpetual “nice girl”, I remember feeling genuine pain (and major indigestion) when I had to hurt someone I cared about.

My first real date. Homecoming Dance, 1994, with one of my best friends.  I felt pretty, cared for, fun, and safe.  It set the bar for dates to come.

The first time I drove a car by myself. It was a freedom I savored—to this day, I find freedom on an empty highway.

The first time I saw my husband cry. We’d had our first argument, I began to cry, and he saw that he’d caused me pain.

The first time I realized I wanted to be a mother someday. I sat in a movie theater by myself, and watched a bouncy, precious little girl meander through the aisles before the film began.  I began to cry.

Life is a collection of firsts.  Some painful.  Some magical.  I’m grateful for them all, and for the story they’ve crafted.

What’s one of your “firsts”?  The moments that you can still visualize, that helped form the narrative of your life?

Posted by Elizabeth

Today my fabulous blog partner is celebrating her 30^th birthday!  Something Anne and I share in common is a sense that we are old souls, a 40 year-old having been born into the body of an infant (I guess that really makes her 70 today).  So when Anne wrote yesterday that turning 30 felt like “catching up” rather than getting older, I can relate.  For me, turning 30, which I did two years ago, felt much the same way, like finally arriving at the external destination that I’d been living my whole internal life.  In the spirit of “acting your age,” I’m stealing an idea from our friends at Mothers of Brothers.  In the comments section below, please complete the following statement:

“I am ___  years old.  Most days I feel physically  ___  years old and emotionally ___ years old.”

In honor of Anne’s 30^th birthday, I’d love to get at least 30 comments today.  And leave your well-wishes or sage advice for the next decade of Anne’s life (in pencil) while you’re at it!

Happy Birthday, Anne!

Posted by Anne

Another December come and gone.  (Almost.)  This is always an interesting time of the year for me…when I pack away the remnants of another holiday season, and begin looking ahead.  I heard someone say on TV the other day that the New Year is all about “starting fresh”, and wiping away the follies and mistakes of the year that’s becoming past tense.  Truth be told, this philosophical nugget came from a perky FoodTV host, and probably had more to do with calorie consumption than existential goal-setting.  But regardless of the source, the sentence resonated with me.  And that’s because I just love a “fresh start”. 

I’ve always been this way.  “Fresh starts” are the reason I love buying a new day-planner each January, and why I literally adore the idea of “spring cleaning”.  Starting fresh is perfect for a change-phobe like myself—it’s a transition that doesn’t constitute drastic change per se—just a new attitude, a new lease on life, and a more organized garage.  And so, each January, I’m usually ready for life to resume its normal rhythm.  I’m ready for routines, to-do-lists that don’t require trips to the post office, and grocery lists that don’t involve cranberries or canned pumpkin.  I’m ready for…normal.  But I’m ready for a new normal.  A “fresh” normal. 

For some reason, this year has been different.  This weekend, my yearly ritual of packing up the holiday decor—which I usually find cleansing—felt somehow hollow.  This year, it was not so cleansing…and not so fresh.  It felt premature and hurried.  And I have no idea why.  I have no idea, because for the first time since I was a freshman in college, I spent the holiday season in one place.  No travel.  No hectic family visits.  Very little “rushing around”.  December progressed right here, in my home.  And December felt longer than it ever has before.  But still…

The literal end of our Christmas...right before bed.

Packing away our tree, the nativity, and the lights—it all felt a little gloomy this year.  When my husband and I dumped our tree at the local tree recycling center, I felt a pang of…something.  When I placed the holy family in their styrofoam packing material, I felt…something.   It’s odd, isn’t it?  When you’re happy—genuinely happy—but something inside you wants for something else.  Even odder when you can’t define it. 

I’m still unsure why the end of the holidays affected me.  All I know is that I wanted to bask in the ending of the season.  I wasn’t ready for the disappearance of pine needles, or to load up the box labeled “Christmas” that sits patiently in storage for 11 months of the year.  I wasn’t ready for the “fresh start” I usually anticipate.           

As a planning addict, this was a new emotion for me.  I’m unaccustomed to this desire to prolong, rather than move ahead.  But finally, I found comfort.  And I found it Sunday morning.  Ryan had to work (the reason for us staying put this year), so as he trudged off to the hospital, I trudged off to Church.  When I arrived, I was relieved to see the Christmas decorations still in their place.  Red and pink poinsettias still graced the front of the sanctuary.  Hanging stars adorned with hand-written prayers hung above my head and danced in the quiet breeze.  The sanctuary—usually full—was thinner, and mostly filled with older couples.  I sat alone, and felt relieved.  I sang the hymns and carols.  And for one more hour, I thought about the season.  It was quiet, personal, and necessary.  For that hour, I stopped moving forward and gave myself what I needed—a goodbye to the season. 

And now I’m ready.  I’m ready to welcome 2010.  I’m ready for my fresh start.  So bring on the New Year!

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

Before

Change.  It’s a core topic here at Life in Pencil. And it just so happens that we’re not the only ones interested in transformation these days.  Change, you see, is also a favorite subject of the holiday season.  Take a look at the evidence, and you’ll see the power of change—it’s everywhere.

Ebeneezer Scrooge: Mean miser becomes charitable and kind…and wears his pajamas in the London streets

The Grinch: Grouchy green creature becomes a softy…and experiences some freaky heart growth

George Bailey: Mr. cranky-pants becomes an appreciative daddy once again…and makes an angel named Clarence very happy

Tim Allen in the Santa Clause: Smart-ass/shoddy father becomes Santa/superdad…and eats a lot of cookies

Frosty the Snowman: Pile of snow becomes human…and takes kiddos on a parade

After

As a culture, we eat these stories up.  After all, most of us are suckers for a good tale of redemption.  And within these stories in particular, there’s something inherently dramatic about the changes our heroes experience.  For one thing, the changes are fast. Scrooge and the Grinch make it happen in just one night.  On top of that, the changes are thorough and complete.  When these guys change, the changes are big. And in every case, change is for the good…mean people become good, greedy people become generous.  (Well, except in Frosty’s case…I imagine he was a nice pile of snow to begin with.)

We (or I?) love these stories because they represent something that’s supposed to happen to us during the holiday season…we’re supposed to become better. Kinder.  And more loving.  And in general, I’ve got nothing against a culturally prescribed season of kindness.  But the sweeping drama of Scrooge and George Bailey?  How realistic are these transformative tales?

I’m sad to say… not very.  I don’t know about you, but in my life, change doesn’t usually come about with the aid of physically visible supernatural spirits.  And when I change, it’s darn hard—I struggle and slip, and make oodles of mistakes.  Yet, when we leave Ebenezer having goose with the Cratchits, we’re left to believe he’ll never feel greed or anger again.  When the Grinch serves up the roast beast, we’re supposed to understand that his heart-growth is permanent.  According to the rules of holiday myth, relapse isn’t part of the story.  And honestly, I’m glad it isn’t.

But the truth is, change is rarely magical.  We try to be better people all the time, and especially during a “season of giving”.  But we stumble.  We complain about annoying relatives, and make uncharitable comments.  And often there’s no ghost to get us moving again.  Just as often as the drama, changes occur in baby steps, small acts of generosity, and faith.  And there’s beauty in the small changes, as well as the big.

Do you try to change over the holidays?  And what holiday tales of redemption did I leave out?

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 Elizabeth

“And once again, as the year draws in, it feels as if a page has turned.  A page – a card – the wind, perhaps.  And December was always a bad time for us.  The last month; the dregs of the year; slouching toward Christmas with its skirt of tinsel dragging in the mud.  The dead-end part of the year looms; the trees are stripped three-quarters bare; the light is like scorched newspaper; and all my ghosts come out to play like fireflies in the spectral sky.”

~ “The Girl With No Shadow” by Joanne Harris

Last week I was talking with Heidi, who was relaying to me how hard the stretch from Halloween to Christmas always is for her.  “It’s a time of so many endings,” she said.  “It’s as if every emotion, every experience we’ve collected throughout the year has to be revisited again.  We unpack the decorations – things we haven’t looked at for a year – and we remember.”

I had never before considered the inherent melancholy the end of the year brings, the darkness often subsumed by twinkling parties and fizzy champagne, fireworks and happy resolutions, silver and gold.  Coincidentally (or not?), for the past few weeks I’ve been reading The Girl With No Shadow, the sequel to Chocolat, which takes place during the exact period of time that Heidi mentioned is so difficult for her – and I suspect, at least to some degree, for all of us.  Never in my life have I experienced a December so full of endings – some good and needed, some difficult and painful; intensified, I’m sure, by the feeling of finality that the end of the year naturally brings.  I’ve slept poorly for days, my slumber undoubtedly disrupted by a heavy feeling that a phase of life is ending, emotion pressing in around me from all sides.  Change is good, I tell myself, but it’s never easy.

These are the darkest days at the end of the year, when memories and emotion flap around me like a long trench coat dancing madly in the wind.  We are forced to remember the events of the year – good, bad, and ugly – before we can move forward; Baby New Year doesn’t let us escape so easily.  I unpack my Christmas ornaments, my tree not just a tree but a collection of memories.  Every ornament is a bluebird, my animal totem, and unpacking the box is like unearthing a piece of my soul.  I gently finger each delicate ornament.  There are bluebirds in nests, huddled together on branches, perched in birdhouses.  Some are thin, some are fat.  Some sport long billowy tail feathers, others a flowery curl of gold.  There is the first one, a gift from my mother 20 years ago, a fat bluebird with pointed wings, which always holds a place of honor on a special bough.  There is the ornament my friend, Holly, gave me years ago, which she fashioned by hand from an old bluebird-shaped Christmas light that screwed onto some Oregon Christmas tree 50 years ago.  Nearly half the ornaments on the tree are from my mother-in-law, who took over the collection when my mother died, and who amazes me every year with her ability to unearth new ones.  No two ornaments are alike, and each bluebird contains a specific memory and meaning, such that when I look at the tree in its entirety I see a life stretched before me.

I light the tree during the day, the house an otherwise gray cave, and I stare at it constantly, the winking lights slicing through the darkness around me and in me and through me.  The lights offer hope during these long, difficult days of memories and endings and goodbyes, a constant reminder that it won’t always be dark.  I do some reading on bluebirds, hoping it will offer me some comfort, some clues.  Bluebirds symbolize a passage, a time of movement into another level of being.  They are a reminder that we are born to happiness and fulfillment, but we sometimes get so lost and wrapped up in the everyday events of our lives that our happiness and fulfillment seem rare.  Bluebirds are gentle and unaggressive, but are very scrappy when threatened. It hits me: this December has been an assault on my very being, threatening the core of my happiness.  I have had to be scrappy and pushy and defend my territory, even when I didn’t want to.  But those lights; they are an ever-present reminder that from death comes rebirth.  Each goodbye brings a new hello.  Each ending a new beginning.  Each painful memory a happier one.  There is duality in everything, perhaps more so than ever as we take our final steps towards the witching hour of the winter solstice, when day and night shares equal time dancing across the landscape.  Change is never easy, I tell myself, but it is good. But today, I am grateful that January is just a page away.

What do you think?  Do you feel the year drawing to a close?  Does December feel different than other months?

I have to brag on my friend, Sarah, who just sent me one of most thoughtful, soulful, and beautiful additions to my bluebird Christmas tree.  Her mom, Peggy, painted this gorgeous ornament for me, which I adore.  It certainly added some light to what has been a dark December for me.

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 Elizabeth

“This year, appreciation may be the best gift of all.”  Or at least that’s the case according to a new Hallmark commercial.

According to yesterday’s New York Times article, “Fewer Gifts and Frills Are Expected in a Rough Economy,” people are giving less this year, and the gifts they are giving are decidedly simpler, drawing on homemade goodies or gifts to be enjoyed at home, where we’re apparently spending more time than ever these days.  Some are forgoing gift-giving altogether, sending greeting cards instead.  While many are touting this “return to simplicity” as the new normal, most are dubious that, once the economic situation rebounds, this more conscious consumerism will quickly fall by the wayside.  And that is a shame, because, as the article states, “while all that cutting back is good for consumers’ bank accounts, many insist it is even better for their souls.”

As I’ve mentioned before, I’ve never been a big gift giver, and my reasons aren’t grounded in any sort of moral or financial reasoning.  Rather, the act of heaping on gifts doesn’t feed my soul.  I find that I – and the receiver – am generally happier with one well-selected gift, a gift that, I hope, is a reflection of that person.  Our mothers told us, “It’s the thought that counts.”  But we’ve all been in a situation where we’ve held a gift in our hands and thought, “This person doesn’t know me at all.  There was no thought or care put into this.”  I’m not concerned with whether a gift is homemade or store-bought, simple or extravagant – only that it be soulful, that it stirs something in me, no matter how small.

I’m not going to tell you a sob story about how I never had any cheery packages under the Christmas tree, or how I search the world over for the perfect gift whose every detail must be imbued with meaning, because none of those things would be true.  I will say, however, that opening gifts on Christmas morning was an exceedingly long-winded affair in my family.  Not because there were so many people (there were only three of us), or because there were mountains of gifts (I’d estimate our household was pretty average).  It was because my parents insisted that we pay attention to the process of gift opening, that we be conscious of what we were receiving.

We opened one gift at a time.  Before the paper was even torn, there was a great deal of speculation as to the contents of the package.  Boxes were tumbled in our hands, testing for weight, a sophisticated mental cross-check occurring between the physical specimen and the gift list.  When the paper was touched – exuberant ripping for me, careful unfolding for my dad – and the box finally revealed, there was a great debate.  Do you think it’s what the box really says it is, or something else? Finally, the gift was unveiled.  That’s when the admiration began.  Oh wow, this is just what I wanted.  You remembered!  You know what I’m going to use this for? Once the gift had been given sufficient attention, two words were required before moving onto the next:  Thank you.

Of course, sometimes this process became a bit much.  My dad was notorious for reading the barcode on the packages, which caused me to roll my eyes and shriek, “Just open it, Dad!”  And every year my father picked up the smallest package under the tree, shook it lightly, held it to his forehead a la Johnny Carson’s The Great Karnak, and declared, “These must be the keys to my new motorboat.”  My dad made this same joke every year.  We all knew there would never be a motorboat – in fact, there would never be anything that extravagant under the Christmas tree, because that’s just not how gift-giving went in our family.  As an adult, I am grateful to have been taught this lesson about gratitude and appreciation.  No matter who I receive a gift from, I find myself going through a truncated version of this process that was passed down to me from my parents.  I’ll never forget the first Christmas I spent with Maikael’s family, where the gifts were devoured with the ferocity of a whirling dervish, the fun over in a matter of minutes.  The next year, I insisted we take turns.

For the first time, I made the vast majority of my Christmas gifts this year.  I created my own festive gift baskets with items I canned from the fruits of my garden this past summer.  Some people received jewel-like jars of organic tomato sauce, nestled in curls of paper with a rustic clutch of spaghetti and a bottle of favored wine, a homey dinner for two.  (There is nothing more soulless, in my mind, than a pre-packaged gift basket, convenient but utterly lacking in charm and personality.)  Others received jars of green tomato-orange jam, a sweet-tart marmalade that my friend, Atarah, gave me the recipe to when I was up to my ears in green tomatoes this fall.  They are simple gifts, not at all extravagant, but I felt a stirring in my soul when I handed over the baskets to the people on my gift list.  And I hope they felt that, too.

Have you cut down your gift list this year?  Are the types of gifts you’re giving different than the past?  How does the opening of gifts go in your house?