Something to Talk About

I'm new at my job. Unsurprisingly, I'm frequently making my way to the printer and end up exchanging pleasantries with folks who don't know me.  Those initial conversations are frequently awkward, so polite as to be ridiculous, but that's the dance we do in new spaces. Because I started this job while going through our second miscarriage, I was more sensitive to some of those getting-to-know-you questions and I was struck by the fact that only women with children asked me if I had children. It was frequently one of their first questions, and perhaps it always has been.  Perhaps it's only now, when we're trying for and losing our babies, that the question lodges somewhere painful and leaves a mark.

I will say, first, that for whatever reason, the second loss has been easier than the first.  Easier in that I knew what to expect, understood what I was feeling, and had a learned timeline of events.  It was not emotionally easier, but I definitely functioned better. No catatonic evenings on the couch writing drippy poetry and sipping whiskey. I'll partly credit the new job for that high functioning sadness but I'll also credit the weird, wonderful resiliency of human experience. But that doesn't lessen the hitch in my breath, feel the hollowness of my answer, "no, no children." I am an excellent actress, so no need to assume this is painful for anyone other than myself. I am slick and clever and any discomfort can be easily sidestepped with a quick reference to lawyer antics, my newest kitchen gadget purchase, or a comment on somebody's fabulous shoes. 

That's fine. Really. I understand the weirdness of meeting and investing in people, asking questions, picking and prodding to determine points of shared interest. We do so desperately want to connect with people and questions are how that information frequently makes its way to us. But I think it's the expectation of the question itself that I find difficult these days. I don't doubt that mothers want to know if there is shared experience there, a shared bond, working mom to working mom, and that's certainly a valid connection to hope for.  But I wish we didn't start there. I wish that wasn't the first of the getting-to-know-you questions.  Because I am positive that I will not be a more interesting person if/when I become a mother. I will never be of more value than I am right now. My worth, vitality will not increase. I will love someone new, cherish someone I've longed for, but I've actually experienced those things before. I could talk about my husband that way. And if you'd spoken to me before I met him, I could have spoken similarly about members of my family, dreams, goals, travels. My mind, my heart, my relationship with the world, they do not become more worthy of interest or bond or connection when I can add "mother" to my list of descriptors. I am wholly myself today and will be wholly myself forever. 

Women without children never struggle here, they don't ask if you have kids. I don't ask women if they are mothers when I meet them.  And it's not because I don't care, it's because their motherhood isn't a key piece of information for me in determining how I will connect with them.  Because motherhood is not something we will link arms over, we have to find other areas to connect. Books, school, autumn, a shared love of americanos with vanilla syrup, travel daydreams, cars in the shop.  I am aware of my increased sensitivity these days but the questions surrounding children feel very much like an audition with some women, as if my choice of monologue is under scrutiny and the cast list won't be posted until Friday. I think it's this assumed lack of invitation, this knocking on the window of a club I'm not invited to, that scratches the wound. Because so frequently after I say I don't have kids, the conversation falters. Even if I joke and bring up my adorable dog.  Even if I ask to know more about the children, what grade, what sport, there's a languishing there and I feel not a little bit left in the cold. 

While we've begun the adoption journey, we don't know how/when that road will end. I wish, in meeting women, we could connect as friends,  as colleagues, as athletes on side by side spinning bikes, as lovers-of-Jane-Austen, as mutual haters of the office copier, as owners of the same leopard print sweater, and leave the do-you-have-kids questions for days, weeks, months down the road.  I wish for many things, and this is one. 

Heirloom

Over the last couple of years I've lost my last remaining grandparents.  As the matriarchs of their respective families, their deaths have brought with them the tidying up of homes, categorization of shoebox pictures, exploration of trinkets and recipe cards, and the divvying up of all of the above. Homes and land were sold, and the piecemeal sediment of their lives has been buried, tossed or scattered to new caretakers in the family and beyond.

A few weeks ago I invited several dear girlfriends over for lunch for the purpose of hosting loved ones around a table decorated with some of those heirloom items.  I inherited my Great Aunt Maryann's china years ago and its delicate blue flowers have been packed away in yellowing newspaper dated for my 20th birthday (deep into the Bush-Gore Florida recount, for those curious). I paired the plates with the crystal I inherited from my Grandmother, goblets for water and sparkling dessert ware. I served tea sandwiches, crusts removed and cucumbers smeared with herbed butter, on milk glass from my Great-Grandmother.

The lunch was quiet and kind, littered with laughter, prayer, clinking of wine glasses, and soft tears. Loss was fresh and ongoing to several at the table, and sometimes that rawness was palpable. Not uncomfortable, but a sort of throbbing warning that hearts nearby are vulnerable, newly wounded. I don't doubt that has frequently been the case for those around my table, and that it will not be the last, but I was buoyed by the memories of the women who cherished these beautiful things, knowing the sisterhood inherent in the drying of tears over crackers and egg salad. It's a gentle and unconquerable love.

The lunch was planned early in the year, scheduled weeks before one loss and in the midst of the other. It was simply a date that worked for all, communal crossed fingers that the weather would not do us in. While chopping and toasting and plating our meal in the kitchen, the day felt tenuous, balanced perfectly on the edge of various seasons for each of us. I was struck by how deeply painful, how horribly unfair life could be sometimes, how frequently we walk around with our wounds fully exposed to the elements. But at the same time, these sweet moments together, unwrapping scarves, knocking snow from our boots, pouring wine, squeezing shoulders and hands, the gentleness of those gestures and the fervor with which we want so desperately to love each other through the messiness of every wound, that felt like God. God deeper than, and yet sensitive to, the ache in every heart.

And I think that's what makes these heirlooms, the ring I wear of Mamaw's, the crystal I use for special occasions, the china I unwrap from aging newspaper, so heavy with import for me. I do not know every heartache experienced by the women before me, but I know that they loved well, that they took care of their sisters, their friends, often at a table. I know that they prayed in the midst of loss, teased a smile out of heartache, and dried a million tears in their decades on Earth, and I like to think that some of that comfort, a lot of that laughter, occurred with these plates, these glasses, sitting on tables in Texas, South Carolina, Arkansas. They can carry the weight of life, and they can hold the memory of more tears, more joy, more laughter for years to come.

Next

There is no bravery in a love that knows what's next
How easy it would be to love
to linger
if we knew the bend and flex
of life's course

The prettiest of loves would crumble beside a hospital bed
had it not the courage of leaping
tear-stained and hopeful
from cozy field of flowers into the dark red
bloom of each delicate human pulse

The guts are never wrung for mere affection
No God-blessed desire checks its watch
counts the minutes
anticipates the reaction
with the comfort of a fortune teller

Love never knows how love will deepen
how easy it would be to love
to linger
if the depth of it did not so often cause the weeping
of tired eyes

Before we walked, love walked before us
wept in our footsteps
and promised us nothing but itself,
no plan, no fortune, but victorious
what is next

Dedicated to a dear friend who is spending time nursing her sister in the hospital. 

Counting Down

Over the weekend we celebrated our engagement with family and friends, successfully introducing the bridal party for the first time. My uncle surprised me in his characteristic Uncle Buck way, flying in for 24 hours to raise a glass to the pending nuptials.  It was a weekend full of family, hugs, love, surprises, bridesmaid dresses, and daydreams about how I should wear my hair with my mother's veil.

Counting down is equal parts intimidating and exciting. As a planner, I can feel the to-dos whispering with every day discarded. But I also have an overwhelming sense of "oh, hurry up, already" at times. Let's get crackin' on the rest of our lives! I don't care about flatware!

Counting down felt a bit holier when surrounded by family and the dearest of friends. It wasn't just a list of boxes to check, it was a taste of what that day will be, how it will feel.  Ches was largely in the kitchen, laughing and making sure our guests were well-hydrated. I floated in the living room and kitchen, catching up with friends I hadn't seen in awhile, introducing Little Debbie to her future in-laws. Occasionally Ches and I would stand still long enough to make introductions, tell a story, tease each other a bit, and then we'd each float back to our people.  I laughed a lot, and I heard Ches laughing, too.

These are some of the people that made him the man I love. And vice versa.

It's a count down to a life that involves them all. Some will be at the wedding, some will not. Some will come over for dinner often, others we'll see sporadically. We'll celebrate birthdays together, other weddings. We'll hold each others hands at funerals, loan each other sunglasses on vacation. We'll set some up on blind dates, we'll ask others for a lift when the car is in the shop. We're counting down to each being more than an introduction.  They'll belong to each of us, in some way.  And all of those little connections amaze me.  Those ties can feel tenuous, but in other moments they feel like some kind of cosmic glue, binding us to the people who teach us how to love and be loved.

Love feels a bit like gravity, a bit like standing on a cliff and hoping for flight, like a soap bubble and a rainbow and a bowl of soup, like a hammer, like a nail, like a law and a theory all rolled into one. I learned love from my people, those in the room on Saturday and those in my heart. I learned love in the reach of their arms and the depth of their laughter, in the fervency of their prayer. And I feel every definition of that love, counting down.

Before It Closes

A couple of weeks ago I had dinner at La Belle Vie.  It was the last week of its 17 year history and I, like others, found myself struck by the fact that the restaurant I'd been saving for a special occasion was cooling its kitchen, closing its doors.

I only happened into dinner due to the invitation of a new, lovely friend. What should have been a threesome of food-loving adventurers, turned into a duo, and I think we muscled through that well. I say "muscled" only from my own perspective, and only due to the import of the restaurant, not due to any lack in my companion. I think for anyone saving an experience, they're saving it for something, someone, in particular. They're saving it for a daydream they can't shake.

The food was beautiful, the service attentive without being cloying, and the company, warm and engaging. I usually leave restaurant posts to my Minneapolis/St. Paul blog, The Minneapolite, so I suppose any dedicated reader of both blogs knows there's a different bent to this musing compared to my typical restaurant raves.

The trouble with going somewhere knowing you'll never be back, knowing you could have been a dozen times before, is that you eat the what-ifs as much as the food. The trouble with saving an experience for an unpromised future, some miraculous moment that lends itself to that specific celebration, is that experiencing it without that miraculous moment risks the experience ringing hollow.

Happily, the meal was less bittersweet than I expected. It felt, instead, like acknowledgment that saving such things is, itself, an increasingly hollow exercise for me. Perhaps it's because my Mamaw is in hospice, and because I'm weeks away from 35, and because I saw the Matterhorn this summer, and because my kid sister is graduating from college, but dinner felt more like a reminder that little is promised us on any given day. Future-oriented dreams are powerful, beautiful things.  But they also cloud our ability to embrace the day God made. This day. The one we're currently in.

My dad blogs, too. And he volunteers at a local hospice.  He comforts the dying and their families, and he answers phones and listens to the stories of people without too many days left to tell stories. In a recent post he mentioned being some folks' "last new friend," and that pierced me.  What an honored thing, to be the last new friend, to anchor a moment like that. I'm not equating moments.  I'm not comparing the eating of a meal at a storied restaurant to the connection made between a friend bound for Heaven and one still (thanks to God) likely earth bound for a while yet. But my dad's post, and his comment, made me sensitive to the time allowed us, the slipperiness of it all.

Daydreams are good and lovely things.  Days are longer without them. But when they lend themselves to saving experiences for some unpromised end, they run the risk of keeping us from the dream altogether. Saving La Belle Vie for something special meant I only had the chance to love it once, when I could have loved it dearly many times over the last few years. It's a mistake I'll try hard not to repeat.

Special can be a Tuesday. It can be a new friend.

Number Six

This picture was taken in 2010, the year after I ran my first marathon. I'd always assumed that I'd only run one race that distance, but as soon as I crossed the finish line I knew I'd do my best to do it forever. Maybe not every year, maybe never any faster than that first one, but forever. 

When I started running I was fat. Not chubby. Obese. Nobody would have ever looked at me and thought, "that girl is destined for marathons!" Over the course of running my first 5K, first 10K, first half, I dropped enough weight (80+ pounds) to no longer categorize myself as fat, at least not objectively. And on some level running continued to be the method by which I sought to escape ever being fat again. Running has continued to have that role in my life and I can't say that I expect that reason to disappear, but my need for a run shifted while training for that first marathon. At some point running stopped being just a means to an end, the end being a body I could accept. At some point running became the single fastest way to make me happy. And that's when I stopped feeling like a poser, some guest in the running world. It wasn't a fad or a quirk while I slimmed down. It was a visceral, emotional need. In my mind, that made me a Runner. Capital R.
Friends who'd known (and loved) me in my fat days voiced surprise and encouragement for my new love of distance running. I always struggled to respond adequately because the running-to-lose-weight thing had lost its luster. Running carried me through every season of doubt, every heartbreak, every disappointment, every joy. It reminds me every day that anxiety is wasted energy, energy better channeled into two feet and the pulse of pavement.

I say all this because my companion in training for my upcoming sixth marathon is Stephanie, pictured beside me. She knew and loved me in law school, when running was the last thing on my mind, and she encouraged me throughout my steady accumulation of race t-shirts. This will be Stephanie's first marathon, and she's flying up from New Orleans to experience Grandma's Marathon in Duluth with me. And she gets that current of joy, that happy easing of the shoulders, when she runs now, too. To be a person who doesn't run and then, over the course of months, to become a Runner (capital R), is a transformation that leaves you a bit breathless. It's like the world opens up, lets you in on a secret, that the agonies of the day are lessened by the quickening of your heart.

All of my marathons have been special.  They've felt important, each in some unique way.  But number six will be especially sweet, because this time a friend who knew and loved me when I wasn't a Runner, will run beside me, having since become a Runner herself. It's a reminder to me that the best friends are the ones who see the stuff buried deep, love the You beneath the flesh and beneath the veneer of accomplishment. The ones who loved you before you dreamed of running a marathon are the absolute best people to have at the finish line.

A Few Different Windows

I've been a guest or confidante to a host of different families in the last few weeks. And given my Uncle Buck's recent trip to visit us, I can't help but view my own family through the lens of having recently examined the dynamics of others.  Perhaps it's comparative in some ways, but I mostly just come away shaking my head, a bit awestruck, that we humans manage to connect at all on this silly planet, even with those of our own blood.

I helped a dear friend with some catering at a party today.  I just provided some plating, dishwashing, filling of coffee cups, and was happy to pitch in to lessen the stress on her family. She discussed, briefly, the anxiety the day had created for her mother, some stresses with a sibling, the joy of a smiling, oblivious baby. She's an articulate woman, my friend, powerful in her ability to put words to ideas. And I was struck by how plainly she spoke of her mother's worries, her difficulties in communicating with or being understood by other members of her family. It made me thankful I could help and also gave me comfort that I am not the only well-spoken woman who stumbles her way through communicating with some of those she holds most dear.

Despite the ties of blood, we're not destined to be friends with our siblings. There is a shared history there, yes, and a common language with which we address life. We feel the weight of the same family secrets or weaknesses or tragedies. But there's no promise that upon adulthood we will sit down at a table and truly feel spoken and connected to, eyeball to eyeball, one fully formed life to another.

One of my dearest friends recently texted and asked for prayers for her family due to stresses with her own siblings, tensions and frustrations that have been building for awhile. This is a family I've known a very long time, so the tensions aren't new to me.  I tried to provide comfort the only way I knew how, by telling her that the best examples of familial harmony fall outside of our home.  No family avoids chaos or animosity every day. And in the seasons when your own family struggles, we can at least trust that the best image of what a father or mother or brother or sister should be remains steadfast. God hasn't stopped being God, even if your brother is being a punk. And even if the tension is miserable, the wounds deep, God still provides help in our trials with the support of friends, a patient ear, a laughing baby, a shared memory.

I've looked out of a few different windows the last few weeks.  I've looked out the glass door at my parents' home and watched my uncle and dad chatting by a fire, my sister curled up in a seat between them. I've looked out a kitchen window in Montana as my boyfriend played with his niece, far flung but well-loved. And today I looked out another kitchen window as my friend's mom held her grandson, grinning enthusiastically at his adoring crowd. Families seem like such delicate machines sometimes, so tricky to handle, so easy to misuse, so quick to weaken with distance or time, and yet they do seem to continue puttering on. The burdens build, the valleys deepen and darken, and still we press on, brothers and mothers and sisters and fathers and wives and nieces and nephews and uncles and grandmothers and grandfathers...

I'm grateful to be surrounded by people who ache when their family aches, who worry when their family worries. I'm grateful to have sat at a kitchen table this morning with my own family, praying for God's continued mercies on my Uncle's cancer fight, praying for continued blessings. And I'm grateful to have stood, a couple of hours later, praying with my friend and her mom, for anxiety-free revelry. The big and the not-quite-as-big, the long trial and the new anxiety, the ache and the burden, God gives us families that create and cushion every wound. And He gave us His example, in hopes that we might love each other better through it all.

The Privilege of Disappointment

I ran my fifth marathon yesterday in Fargo, North Dakota. I'm nursing my usual wounds today of aching calves, stiff quads, and shoulders that swear they carried the weight of the world for 26.2 miles. The course wasn't my favorite, lots of cement, lots of twists and turns in not-particularly-interesting Fargo suburbs (no offense, suburban Fargoans), and a finish line that did not make it clear in which direction I needed to walk to find chocolate milk. But the small town support was impressive and, at times, raucous, and that goes a long way to paint my memory of those miles in a positive light.

As hinted by this post's title, this run was not my best. I came in a couple minutes slower than my previous best time despite being 7-8 pounds lighter than that previous race day, and despite feeling better prepared than I"ve ever felt for a marathon. I can't pinpoint the key hurdles.  There was an ache in my foot that came out of nowhere (although it is the foot that routinely gives me trouble).  There was the tightness in my calves at the start. There was the slight difference in fueling the day before since I was in a different town with different options. There was the Zyrtec I had to pop for days beforehand to battle the pollen onslaught. But none of these should have been disastrous. They were all surmountable, all annoyances I have dealt with myriad times before.

It just wasn't my best day. It wasn't my best run. It's still a marathon, of course. It's still an accomplishment. But the more I run, the more miles I trek on trails or roads around town, the more keenly I feel the privilege of disappointment. I know my body well enough to know when a run is as near perfect as my body can muster. And I know when the smoothness of that perfection is lacking. I can feel the "off"-ness of my gait, the not-quite-loose churning of joints and stretching of muscle. I can be proud of the effort involved without being happy with the result.

I think that's a distinction that comes with maturity, maybe with age, certainly with experience. It was easy, with my first long runs six years ago, to equate the worth of a run with how closely it came to my ideal.  If my expectation was 10 miles at a 10:30 pace and instead I found it hard to push below 11:00, I'd end a run disgusted with the time wasted on a failure. Even if I could tell myself it was practice, it was training, beneath a feigned acceptance of that reality was a thick layer of disapproval. The high fives and congratulations from friends on races that ended short of my expectations felt like mockery, felt like a highlight of what I could not achieve.

My dear friend, Katrina, also ran the Fargo Marathon. She finished after the official clock ran out, finished when the cones were being taken down on the side streets and the volunteers were packing up. She ran several miles all alone, a feat in-and-of itself that astounds me. But one of the things I learned that was most inspiring was that Katrina had already worked through the possibility of being last, months prior, when she signed up.  She knew the length of the race would be a challenge unlike anything else she'd sought to accomplish and she knew that if she was afraid of being last, she'd never be brave enough to train. So, in a testament to her strength, she trained with the acceptance of that solitude, acceptance that she might cross the finish after the crowds dispersed. It doesn't just take guts to press onward when you're trailing the pack, it takes guts to stand at the starting line and know that your battle will be harder than most. You should read her story, here.

The disappointment I felt with my own time eased as I waited for Katrina's own victory. The frustration tied to a rough run felt like a medal, heavy but shiny. The body is an amazing machine. The mind is even more powerful, capable of asking more from a body even after that body has begged for rest. My own disappointment didn't disappear, I was still saddened by my failure to attain a goal. But praying for a friend while she pressed through pain rearranged that sadness, made it feel less like a burden and more like a privilege. It's a gift to tax our bodies like this, to push them beyond the limits we imagine and the limits life creates for us. And with that gift comes the privilege of disappointment when our efforts fall short of our goals.

On the ride home from Fargo, Katrina and I discussed future goals, races we might run, times we'd like to beat, opportunities for more aching calves and sunburned shoulders. To struggle, emerge victorious, limp, and then ask, "what's next?"...that's a privilege, too.

Nelly

Her name was derived from her provenance. She was a gift when I returned from Peace Corps in honor of my graduation from Washington and Lee University (W&L, or Dub-Yuh-NELL).  As a moderate hippie, I certainly couldn't call her Dubya.

I chose a Golf in large part because a Peace Corps friend spoke glowingly of her old Golf, a small but mighty car that just wouldn't die. Resilience seemed like a good trait in a car and so when I started test-driving options, the Golf was already high on my list.  I loved her immediately, her nifty interior lights, her smooth ride, her heated seats.  She seemed spunky and fun-loving, sassy but solid.  I will admit some hope that maybe I was all those things, too.

We bought her in St. Louis but she spent only a brief time there.  She had some hiccups in the beginning, a warped windshield was replaced, which damaged the windshield wipers.  She was sorted out just in time for a move to Kansas City, a year now affectionately referred to as my "lost year" since I lived in a hovel of an apartment that included a collapsing ceiling over the shower and a Craigslist-acquired roommate that lived off cheese. Only cheese. Nelly was the sole object of worth I could count as mine. I didn't have a computer. I was sleeping on an air mattress. And I was making $10/hour and could barely afford my phone bill. Nelly was a daily reminder that something in my life was just fine, even if everything else seemed tenuously stitched together.

She carried my best friend, Megan, and I safely through the worst ice storm of my life, when a 4 hour drive became 9 hours.  We rode in tank tops so that we could blast the heat against the windshield, the only way to keep the wipers from freezing.  After a few hours, my nerves were shot, and Megan drove Nelly back home to Kansas City, with a stop on the way to aid a driver whose SUV had flipped off the highway.

Once I was accepted to Tulane for law school, Nelly made the thrilling trek to New Orleans, stuffed to miniscule capacity with everything I owned. My furniture in New Orleans was either acquired from the side of the road, if small enough to fit in the trunk, or the assemble-yourself variety you find at Big Lots, because assembly required furniture comes in boxes that fit in a Golf.  You can find (or build) decent furniture with the constraints of a Golf for transport, so don't let her size fool you.

Nelly was my chariot for four evacuations, including Hurricane Katrina. She picked up my dear roommate, Stephanie, and drove south to Jackson and on to to New Orleans to survey the damage a couple of months after the storm.  She sat in the driveway and kept watch along a destroyed street while Stephanie and I cleaned out a rotted fridge, threw a couch over the balcony, and while I tried to rescue the masses of journal entries, poems, and law school notes I'd left sitting next to an open window. Nelly carried us out of the city, too, past homes with red "X"s and numbers, out of the reach of the massive Army vehicles I'd never expected to see patrolling my home.

She returned to New Orleans, too, and embraced a recovery that meant more potholes, two stolen hubcaps, and heat that curdled the milk from a spilled latte within hours. She drove out of New Orleans, bound for Minneapolis, with the trepidation of knowing the winters thus far had not been adequate practice for what lie ahead.

The first large snow at the first Minnesota apartment was tricky given that I didn't own a shovel.  Nelly was dug out of the snowplow-gifted snowbank with a frying pan until a neighbor laughingly came to our aid with a legit tool.  Having read a terrifying article about hypothermia and blizzards, I stocked Nelly's trunk that first winter with granola bars, chef boyardee (logical), candles, and at least 12 boxes of matches. The chef boyardee was eventually discarded but I still find matches back there...

I have cried in her driver seat so many times, most recently after the receipt of devastating news. I've called my mother crying after a breakup, sitting in a Walgreens parking lot.  I've gripped her steering wheel with frozen fingers after snow-caked trail runs.  I've dug her out of 6 winters' worth of snowstorms.  I've coaxed her engine to turn over at -19, knowing that the trick is to turn the key slowly backwards.

Nelly's last rites were read today.  Having driven her into a cement pillar at a decent enough clip to deploy the airbags and smash headlights, bumper, and who knows what else, her life ended keeping me safe and relatively unscathed. I'll take a trip to the body shop to clean her out, take a picture with her last remaining legit hubcap (the rest are knockoffs), and thank her for a decade of devoted service.  In a period of my life that often felt transient and unstable, she was a comfort.  And I will miss her.

Before You Were Born

This last month has not been my favorite.  I'd say, actually, that since the end of October I've been certifiably bummed out, low, exhausted. I'm not one to mope for extended periods of time, so I haven't been curled up in bed reading Anna Karenina or anything that dour.  But my generally incessant optimism has been a bit clouded of late, a bit less blind, a bit less sunny.

That this mood coincided with my birthday is, at first blush, unfortunate.  Nobody would want to greet the new year with a grey haze on the horizon. But I can recognize now, the day after my 32nd birthday, how much easier it is to overcome a season of disappointment when surrounded by every evidence of love.

In January I made a quasi-crazy decision to run at least a half-marathon every month of 2012. I signed up for races, most of the 13.1 mile variety but a few of greater distance, and found myself lacking in only one month, the month of my birth.  November/December are not prime half-marathon season up North. I took this as a divine sign that I needed to fly to  New Orleans in December for a half-marathon but that still left November race-less.

My dad gave me the idea of crafting my own race, and I sent out invites early in November detailing the proposed craziness.  13.1 miles (13.4, actually) around the lakes near my apartment, hopefully supported by a few friends here and there and culminating in beers and burgers at a bar downtown. When late October ended with the end of a relationship, appropriately enough right after my October half-marathon, I contemplated canceling the race.  I could run the distance on my own, no need for additional festivities, no need to highlight my depression with glaring requirements for jubilation. The support was really superfluous anyway, I ran longer on my own all the time.  I listed a lot of justifications internally for calling the whole thing off.

The reasons I felt I could not cancel came in the form of friendships. Text messages and the occasional tease about my silly race, questions about where the mulled wine station should be located, inquiries into my sanity, requests for where an intrepid bike rider might join the fray, what my preferred snack might be around mile 5. I didn't have the heart to be less than the bubbly woman most of my friends expect, and didn't want my 32nd birthday to be the one I remembered as "Canceled Due To Sadness."  So I faked enthusiasm for this race, and crossed my fingers that it would feel legitimate eventually.

A dear friend ran the length of the race with me and we chatted about work and church and general gossip, the way women do.  We were joined for 6-7 miles by two other dear friends, one on two wheels and the other my first and biggest cheerleader of this marathon nonsense. The run went quickly, not only because we chatted and laughed the whole way, but because I was greeted by friendly faces every few miles.

I don't think anyone ever outgrows the grin that accompanies clapping and cheering of one's name. My friends, Sharon and Amy, were the first pit stop, manned with gatorade and twizzlers and gummi bears and hugs.  Sharon cheered me on at my first half-marathon several years ago, and I was reminded of that when I heard her call my name. Still "Go Rachel", still running, still smiling, still one step in front of the other, still surrounded by friends, none of this has changed.

Other friends, along with my parents, peppered the rest of the route.  Mile 12 held the added bonus of girlfriends in brightly colored jackets and silly hats, offering a thermos of mulled wine to cushion that last mile. With each hug and high five and smile, I mirrored the same.  And my smiles were borne largely out of surprise. I just kept wondering why all of these folks showed up, why my friends ran and biked with me, why my mom brought those pretzels, why my dad would tell stories about me, why anyone would carve time out of their weekend to do something this ridiculous. The race was a purely self-serving endeavor. The goal was unimportant for everyone but me, and yet I was important enough to support on a Saturday morning. It seemed nuts. Are all of my friends nuts?

I have no expectation that broken hearts heal overnight, or that a string of happy moments adequately guard one's mind from venturing down darker paths on occasion.  But I think God takes care of people in ways fashioned purely for that individual.  I think He knows how to wrap us up and heal us in ways we don't even imagine as necessary.  When I crafted this race a couple months ago, I had no idea that I would need it.  It was a silly way to celebrate a birthday. But after that run, shoes removed, sitting on my couch and waiting for the sitting-on-the-couch-sadness to take over and make me feel small again, I instead was struck by how many people hugged me that day, who gave me flowers, who brought me cupcakes, who brought me a rosemary bush, who bought my lunch, who wished me a happy year, who signed a card.  And despite a month of feeling unimportant and easily discarded, I felt God hold me closely and whisper, "I made this day for you, before you were born."

Epiphany #1: Superior Hiking Trail "Race"

Yesterday I traveled 29 miles (on foot) along the Superior Hiking Trail.  When I signed up for the experience months ago (and coaxed my dear friend, Kristen, into coming along), I assumed the trail would be much like other trail races I've run in the past. I assumed we'd end up running 60-70% of the trail and walking the remaining assumed steep slopes or last few marathon miles. I'd also assumed the race would be 27 miles. Lots of incorrect assumptions.

Due to the flooding this summer in Duluth, the race was pared down to a measly 24.5 miles just prior to our start. We managed to tack on an extra 4 miles due to a couple of wrong turns that left us being dubbed "those girls" by race organizers ("those girls" who keep getting lost and calling/asking for directions).  While we ran a sizeable percentage of the first 10 miles, the last 18 or so were strictly hiking due to a steep and rocky terrain I clearly knew nothing about going into the race. The organizers, in fact, didn't even refer to it as a race.  It was an "experience," not a competition.  I can appreciate that, especially since we came in dead last.

But the challenging of assumptions is not the epiphany referenced in this post.  And as the heading would imply, there was more than one epiphany to detail.  The first one, both temporally and in terms of importance, started with my forgetting my cell phone at home. Along the trail it didn't bother me, at least not much, that I couldn't text family and friends with updates as we trekked along.  But the first few miles, burdened as I was by stunning views that I could not capture via phone camera, I was saddened and honestly frustrated by my inability to share the images in front of me.  But the further we ran, the deeper we trekked into the woods, the more brilliant the sunrise, the more I realized how much of my frustration was at my own fears, less so any desire to share beauty with those not with me. "How will I ever remember this?" was the thought that dogged my steps. I was consumed by a need to document these moments for posterity's sake, when I should have been basking in them for the gift that they were.

I have no pictures of this trail. Kristen captured a few on her phone that may or may not turn out.  But they're her pictures, not mine. She stopped to take shots at points that I wouldn't have.  And she didn't stop to take the photos that would have stopped me.  That's indicative of personal perspective, what strikes each of us, and the moments that struck me remain solely in my head.

The colors were perfect.  I worried on the drive up that the winds around Duluth would have stripped all the ash trees of their leaves, but by some miracle we ran through woods of the deepest reds and brightest yellows.  We started in the dark, headlamps illuminating a shimmer of frost.  We ran for 30 or 45 minutes before the sunshine was sufficient.  And a sunrise in the woods surrounding Lake Superior is a sunrise no camera could capture.

Eventually my frustration with losing the chance to properly document the experience faded and was replaced by what should have been there in the first place: gratitude. Every inch of the forest floor was peppered with color.  The trees are dense enough to create a blanket of reds and oranges, but sparse enough to allow enough light to shine through for bright green grass to grow.  So the fall colors exploded next to shimmery, frost-touched, just-mowed-the-lawn green shades. And while I'll never be able to share with anyone what that particular slice of Earth looked like, I'm not sure God's purpose in crafting such moments had anything to do with what I could post to Facebook.

So much of life is shared these days.  I don't mean shared in the sense of emotionally bonded and burdened, but shared in the surface sense.  Pictures are posted on Facebook, faces tagged. Messages flood Twitter with restaurants labeled, places checked in, hashtags properly affixed.  In many ways it's a gift, because it means those who live far apart can experience, even superficially, the moments that mean something to distant loved ones.  And there are connections made and friendships created by these technologies that perhaps would not have occurred without their aid. But as my frustration with my inability to "share" faded into quiet contemplation of the beauty in front of my eyes, I wondered how many moments I have failed to fully sink my teeth into because I was too consumed by the need to capture them.

Deprived of the means to document this run, I was able to experience it for what it was.  It was a chance to be away from Life for a bit, in the company of a dear friend, with nothing but fall colors, the chill of autumn, and a steady supply of trail mix to support me. It was the distant sound of a train (I love trains!) when we ventured close to civilization, and the crunch of ash leaves, and the scrubbing of dirt-encrusted skin in a well-deserved shower. It was a hodgepodge of moments I could dig into without care or worry as to whether I'd take the right picture, post the right status, or text the right people with the right missive about my adventure.  It was just me embedded in the moments God gave me. And I loved all of those moments.

And Epiphany #2 will be posted shortly. :)

My Music Friend

I've never really had a music friend before.  I've had friends who shared a mutual affection (read: obsession in the case of U2 and my bestie, Megan) for a band or singer.  And I've gone to concerts with boyfriends or boys-who-are-friends and had a few too many beers lounging on grassy lawns listening to who-knows-who do a sound check. I've managed to drag a host of people to Dulono's for bluegrass and a few actually agree to be dragged again.

But I've never had a buddy who loved pretty much everything I love about music.  Kim is the first. Now, we diverge in some ways.  Kim has not yet been schooled on the awesomeness that exists in much of country music, her experience having been tainted by some too-poppy quasi-country hacks. But she respects Tammy Wynette so she can't be a total lost cause.

And my tastes can run a bit more mellow than Kim's on occasion.  I can spend a good month of my life dedicated to the National and emerge without feeling too suicidal, and I think maybe that would drive Kim to madness.

But my best music memories in the Twin Cities have been with Kim, slightly divergent tastes notwithstanding.  The important aspect of our balance is that we both, quite simply, want to be THERE. The radio is nice, CDs are nice, iPods are nice.  But whenever possible, whenever tickets aren't exorbitantly expensive (and sometimes when they are), whenever we can justify a week night outing that will result in a painful weekday morning, we want to be there.

We joked last night that we're rather doomed by the weather.  Every show we've seen has been cursed by some facet of awfulness in that regard.  The first show we saw together, Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeroes, was one of the more disgusting concert experiences of my life.  It had to have been 95, 80% humidity, and the venue was packed.  We squeezed as close as we could to the front (Kim is a squeezer, moreso than I, but her habit has rubbed off on me and now I want to shimmy as close as I can to the stage).  The smell of pot and patchouli was enough to make the beers we were drinking somewhat superfluous, but drinking water would have been lame. I was wearing a short skirt and a thin tshirt and within 20 minutes both were soaked with sweat. All we did was dance, laugh, and comment on how amazingly unattractive we'd both become.  At the end of the set, when everyone was drunk and soaked in sweat, the lead singer, Alexander, had the brilliant idea that we should all sit down. This was not a soft, grassy field.  This was a beat-up, needed-to-be-repaved-30-years-ago lot full of bodies too bunched together for what would become a sit down.  But slowly everyone maneuvered.  I was standing next to some kid in his early 20s who was clearly enjoying some sort of herbal experience and he patted his knee and said, "don't worry, just sit on my lap."  So I half-sat on an infant's lap and half-sat on pavement that left tiny pieces of concrete on my thigh when I stood up.  By the time Kim and I wandered back to her car, we were exhausted, danced out, and in desperate need of a showers.  And I have never enjoyed a show so much.

We've seen other bands, too, many in equally hot and steamy environments (considering how rarely it gets like that up here it does seem odd that Kim and I manage to pick the concerts that boil), and some in the rain (Rock the Garden 2011), and some in both (Bastille Day block party). Sometimes the bands have been amazing, sometimes they've been okay, sometimes there have been surprises (I had no idea HarMar Superstar resembled Homer Simpson).  But what I love about Kim is that she's up for all of it, all of the imperfection of live performance, coupled with the excitement of hearing voices you love sing songs you love.

And I think mutual musical affection is a key connecting point for me, perhaps moreso as I get older.  There are seasons of your life that feel impossible to describe.  But if I tell Kim I have been listening to Bon Iver nonstop for a month, I know, in some small but not insignificant way, that she knows what the month feels like for me, what comfort I require, what music makes the days a bit more palatable.  And vice versa.  There's a communication possible in music choice and attachment that transcends "how was your day?" and gives a fuller picture of the answer than "it was okay."

I know, on her bad days, Kim needs to hear something with a beat worth dancing to, even if she isn't up to it.  And she needs music you can eat soup to, with her pup in her lap, that makes the stress feel less insurmountable and the question marks of everyday life a little less daunting.  And Kim knows that on my bad days, I just need some The National playing in the background, and I need a text message reminding me that David Bowie exists.

Steve

I learned last night that I lost a friend last week.  His name was Steve and he'd been in my bible study for nearly two years.  We'd bonded over both having lived in Louisiana for a spell and swapped hurricane evacuation stories.  He was quiet, reticent even, and did not share much of his life.  But he showed up at 7pm most Tuesdays to share a bit of the Bible and our group prayed for him weekly.

I wish that I could say his death was a complete shock.  I'd feel better about that.  But he'd appeared ill for a long time, a subject I broached once or twice but didn't press as he always claimed to be fine, only tired.  I do not know how Steve died, but I know he'd intended to keep whatever battle he was fighting private and I suppose, even in death, he was successful.

The memorial today was very small.  His family drove from out-of-state, just the four of them, and expected to remember Steve alone.  Steve's mom called a friend from Steve's phone, however, and that friend called me.  So the four of Steve's family were joined by four of Steve's friends, still a quiet group but Steve would have appreciated the symmetry.  We prayed together, said the Lord's prayer, shook hands and gave hugs, told small stories. All what people do at such things.

But what struck me, and what always strikes me at funerals/memorials, is how impossible it is for me to fathom standing in a room like that, with those tears and that heartache, without God.  Steve hadn't told his parents about his bible study.  When his father met me he wondered, tearfully, if that was because Steve worried his parents would disapprove of his being involved in a non-Catholic group.  But his father just said how happy he was to know Steve had been reading the Bible, what a comfort it was to find a Bible in Steve's condo, how any father would just want to know their son was seeking God.

I cannot begin to imagine the loss of a child.  The only thing I can vaguely imagine would be if I lost my brother or my sister, the two people who, even moreso than my parents, understand every intricacy of my past and present.  And I would mirror Steve's dad's words on that point.  It would matter so little to me what roads and missteps and explorations led them to God, as long as I could trust that they got there, that they believed, that they recognized Truth.  The priest at the service today echoed that sentiment, knowing that Steve had begun attending a protestant church, focusing on the steps of Steve's journey (parents who baptized and raised him in the church, a personal exploration of God that led him to study other Christian beliefs) and stating that the joy of that journey is that it sought God. Not Catholicism.  Not Protestantism.  The God of the Bible. The God whose death and resurrection we just celebrated.

And it was not lost on me (nor on anyone in that room, I imagine) that at the time of that Easter celebration, when I was singing of a Wondrous Cross in a wooden pew 3 blocks from where I sit now, Steve was singing, too, next to his heavenly father.

Running Home

My New Year started quietly.  I was asleep when the clock struck midnight as I, somewhat idiotically, had signed up for a New Year's Day race.  Nobody should be running outside in January in Minnesota.  I put in my 6.2 miles, less than half of what I'd actually signed up for, and vowed to never again run in anything approaching 45 mph wind gusts again. Ice isn't cool, either.

That day was also Day #1 in my kinda nutty plan to run 1,000 miles in 2012.  I'm honestly not sure I can hack it.  I'm two weeks in and feeling fine, but keeping up an average of 3 miles a day when I don't really want to run everyday will be tricky.  It's a nice, round, solid goal though and likely a suitable companion to whatever marathon I decide to train for this year.

The weekend after the New Year, I flew to St. Louis, a former home where I've spent very little time in the last 7-8 years.  It's rather amazing to me that a place can be so important for so long and then all your ties can seemingly evaporate, parents move away, friends move away, and that city simply becomes a place on a map you used to call home. Used to. But now my brother and sister-in-law have settled there and it's cheaper to fly there than Kansas City, where my best friend lives, so all of the sudden St. Louis has resurfaced in my life.  Not just the home of my baseball team, but the home of people I love, worth a visit. Worth a plane ticket, worth the calories in a Ted Drewes frozen custard, worth the vacation days, worth all the standard units of measure by which I justify most decisions.

As I am committed to this kinda nutty 1,000 mile goal, I needed to run a couple times while in town.  I was staying at the home of my best friend's parents, the McDermotts, a home I graced as often as my own in high school.  I spent years in that back bedroom talking about boys, years in that basement watching movies and crushing on my best friend's older brother, years of summers during college spending every hour I wasn't waiting tables shopping and gossiping and daydreaming with my best friend.  Her home was always more of a home base for our friendship than mine. She is the baby of the family and we didn't have to worry about those bothersome younger siblings of mine when we were at her place.  Plus, she had a pool.

The first morning I ran in St. Louis, I took as familiar a trek as is possible.  I ran from her home to what used to be mine.  Round trip, it's a hilly four miles. I ran past our old high school, past the curve in the road where I got my one and only speeding ticket (mere weeks after getting my license), past the elementary school where I met the best friend who has remained my best friend.  I didn't spend any time in front of my old house.  What's there to do, really?  I ran to the end of the driveway, gave the house a good glance, then turned around and ran back. 

I thought for a moment what it would be like to be a child and capable of seeing snippets of the future.  If my 15 year old self, all chubbiness and zits and ugly glasses (but such a good student), could have looked out the window one January morning and seen a 31 year old version of herself (less chubby, less zits, contacts), would it have made her happy? Hopeful? I wonder now if I'd like to see some small inkling of my future self, in passing.  I think it would have been nice, at 15, to see a smiling, healthy, rosy-cheeked and running future Me.  Even if I knew nothing else, it would have been nice to see the happiness.  No sense telling Younger Me about the stress of student loans, the myriad heartaches coming her way, the anxiety of jobs and life in general. I think my younger self would have seen the simple, basic truth of that morning.  My best friend is still my best friend, the most important people in my life at 15 remain the most important people at 31, my life is good, my body is strong, and I'm happy.  It would have been inspiring knowledge for a girl at 15.

And it's good to know now, at 31.

Filling the Fish Bowl

Several years ago, before I moved to New Orleans to begin law school, a dear girlfriend, Justin, gave me a beautiful greenish glass fish bowl.  The purpose of said bowl was to house my growing collection of corks, which I'd begun to gather while in Peace Corps.  When possible, I required those with me at the drinking of a bottle of wine to sign and date the cork.  That fish bowl traveled with me to law school and traveled again to Minneapolis and has enjoyed eight years of slow accumulation of corks.  It was getting a bit crowded in that bowl.

Last night I celebrated my 31st birthday in the company of my six dearest ladyfriends and my Marmee (who is, of course, more than a ladyfriend): Molly, Julie, Kim, Megan, Fiona, and Kristen. Molly, knowing my snug fishbowl situation, gifted me with a beautiful new (and huge) repository to continue my cork habit.

As I was transfering eight years of corks into their new home, it became apparent how appropriate it is that a dear girl gave me my first fish bowl and a dear girl gave me my second.  The contents of the bowl are, by and large, the work of girlfriends.  There are a few corks with the initials of ex-boyfriends, but those were likely acquired by begging on my part given my tendency to date staunch beer drinkers.  There's a signed Coke cap from a boy I kissed in Kansas City, and cork signed from a boy I cared about while in Peace Corps.  But those are the exceptions to the rule.  This is a decidedly female treasure.

There are a few non-corks in the bowl.  There's a shell from a bullet found in the neck of my shirt following my first (and only) trip to a shooting range (which I was appalled to learn that I loved). There's a garter that rested on the rim of a margarita I drank with the dear lady who gave me my first bowl.  There are a few matchbooks from the Columns, the Delachaise, and Muriel's, three of my favorite New Orleans haunts. There are a handful of doubloons, leftover from who knows how many parades in my old home. 

But it's the corks that tell the stories.  Dates I had to rack my brain about, wee messages scribbled on the side in faint pen, which I cannot recall the import of. And beautifully familiar initials.  SV, KP, MCM, Juice, KC, MW, JK, KS, SS, FF, CL, CE, MP, JR, MBL and on and on...the ladies who have loved me best in my life. 

The bowl sits on the edge of my window sill, framed by a triplicate of photos from Morocco, dried flowers from a boy and my best girl, and a bright orange fish painting by my kid sister. As I filled the bowl last night (so much room to fill!), I was struck by the testament of that ledge to the blessed fullness of my life.  When I've blown out candles in the past I've wished for large and small things.  I've wished to be skinnier, I've wished to find a husband, I've wished to be and find things that I hoped would make me happier.  But last night at dinner I wished that I would appreciate the overabundance of love I have tucked into my life, that joy would be my first instinct, instead of continually noting what I feel my life lacks. 

And joy found me quickly, struggling to read those initials, those dates, remembering in vague snapshots how each of those moments felt, the depth of happiness that comes from laughing and crying over bottles of red in the company of women who treasure you.

It's the fastest reciprocation of a birthday wish I've ever experienced, which tends to happen, I suppose, when the wish is a prayer of a thanksgiving.

Marathon Deux: Sharing Post-Its

Yesterday I ran my second marathon.  22 miles of feeling-pretty-good, followed by 4.2 miles of I-would-like-to-die-please.  I suppose that's typical.  As this was not my first marathon, I didn't have the worries of whether or not I could finish, but I did worry that I wouldn't make my time goal (which I didn't), and after realizing that desired finish was impossible (around mile 23), I worried that I'd love this race less than the first one.

But I suppose marathons, like every other race, tend to take on the qualities of joy/sorrow that the time period of training and completion has inspired.  I have the first-half-marathon memory, the fastest-half-marathon (coupled with the half-marathon-with-the-kid-sister) memory, the half-marathon-the-day-after-the-breakup memory, the half-marathon-in-a-downpour memory, the first-full-marathon memory.  And now, I have the marathon-with-Kristen memory.

Kristen is one of my dearest friends.  It's a friendship that has only developed in the last couple of years, but it has been a huge, happy blessing in my life.  One of those friendships that after it's made, you can't quite remember how you lived without it.  She's a better, faster runner than I am, but she'd never done a marathon, so I was happy to weasel her into signing up for this one.  We didn't run together often, but we talked about it all the time.  We supported each other through injuries (this was not a good year for ankles) and various mental and physical hurdles, and we celebrated the milestones that build a training program (survival of the 20-miler is a big one).

But, more importantly, she is someone I could share my post-its with.  In 2009, for my first marathon, I wrote two verses on post-its.  One post-it had Isaiah 40:31, one had Hebrews 12:1.  They were always the verses that meant the most to me while running, and carrying them along lifted me at the moments I needed lifting. After the race, I stuck the smeared, ugly surviving scraps on my fridge, where they rested until yesterday.  I gave Kristen my Isaiah 40:31, and I kept Hebrews for myself, promising myself that if a poor, flimsy post-it could survive a marathon, I could surely survive another one, too.

I have been blessed by many wonderful female friendships, each of them dear to me, and a handful more lasting and powerful than others.  I cannot say that my friendships with practicing Christians are the more important ones, because that is completely untrue.  My best friends, Christian and non-Christian alike, have loved and carried me in ways that are counted as blessings in my life, regardless of whether I thank God for that and they don't. But it is a special, intimate joy to be able to share God with someone who means so much to you, for it to be an uncomplicated, easy thing, to pass a piece of paper with a bible verse written on it to a friend and know that she values the words and what they are capable of as much as I do.  I don't have to say, "this is why this is important to me." I could articulate it if I wanted to, but to have the explanation be unnecessary is a remarkable thing. 

So the marathon-with-Kristen memory is deeper than that.  This is the marathon-I-shared-my-post-its memory, which is infinitely more special.

Stu

One of my colleagues, Stu, is retiring tomorrow (we've hoped against hope that it was all an April Fools' Day joke but, alas, he seems determined).  I don't know that I've ever stated where I work so I won't break tradition now by speaking of it too closely, but I believe I've made mention before that I work for the State of Minnesota. 

Stu has been a public servant at the agency where I currently hang my hat for longer than I've been alive.  As he browses my blog fairly often, I won't belabor that point.  Suffice it to say, I was terrified by that level of experience when our boss first delivered me to my little grey cube.  I was told that my neighbor could answer any question I might have and that I should pester him accordingly.  Stu and I went to lunch that first week, just the two of us, and he proceeded to ask me what I knew of economics.  My blank stare probably unnerved him.  Beyond a layperson understanding of preferred stocks and enough recall of Keynes from college to be dangerous, my grasp of Econ was about as graceful as a pig in heels. I'm a lawyer, does that evoke any form of confidence? I could write well, I knew my way around a statute, and I was curious.  I'm not sure I sold him on my worth at that point but we at least established that we could talk about books.  Lots of books.

I pestered him often that first year and routinely in the year and a half since.  "Stu, I have a question..."  "Stu, do you have a minute?"  "Stu, I don't understand..." "Stu, does this make sense?"  "Stu, can you explain..."
While he left teaching to join the agency staff decades ago, in every answer he was a Teacher.  Never patronizing, never unkind, always happy to brighten the darkness around any number of issues that popped up during the day.

But it isn't the professional counsel that I'll miss most (although I am tempted to call him at home for a few choice dockets).  I'll miss the 8 a.m. meeting of the Quiz Crew to fuss over Isaac Asimov's daily quiz, followed by a reading of the same set of cartoons (nobody can do Sally Forth or Dilbert or Doonesbury like Stu).  I'll miss slow wanders to the Lobby Shop for my coffee and Stu's 60 cent milk.  I'll miss Stu's chivalry, always opening the door.  I'll miss his voice over the wall reading any number of quotes from various Red and Blue-affiliated interests.  I'll miss being teased for my quasi-love of Ayn Rand (but I'm a Liberal, Stu, I promise, just a conflicted one).  I'll miss his asking me how my races went, how my training runs went, how I liked this or that play/book. I'll miss his "good morning," as we both made our way to desks shortly before 7 each day.

I think the best type of colleague is the one that makes everyone around them better at what they do.  Everyone who worked with Stu was a better economist/analyst/lawyer/regulator for having known him.

And the best sort of friend makes you recognize the better person you could be.  It isn't a matter of judgment, but of displaying, without fanfare or expectance of praise, what Goodness and Integrity look like in a walking, talking, breathing human being.  I am a better person because I met and worked with Stu, and I will miss him for it.

Tallulah

I met Stephanie while in law school.  She, Kat, and I were inseparable, and many of my posts at the birth of this blog were inspired by our threesome's experiences with New Orleans, studying, and testdriving as many fancy cheeses and cheap wines as law school loans would allow. 

The bulk of my girlfriends, aside from Kat and Steph, are single.  Kat and Steph are two of my dearest ladies, and they also happen to be my closest friends who are married.  As is befitting that station, first comes love, then comes marriage, and now there's a baby carriage in the mix...

Steph is a Mama now, and has only recently entered that (I imagine) tenuous, thrilling, exhaustive period of figuring out how not to break the baby.  Itty bitty babies seem highly breakable to me, despite billions of them surviving babyhood every year.  I imagine this fragile-ness would feel all the more acute if you were actually said baby's mother.  So despite her son's big, healthy babyness, I imagine there is an element of "holy crap, I hope I don't screw this up!" coursing through her days, which would only be exacerbated by lack of sleep (again, this is just supposition on my part, I know when I'm sleepy I pour coffee in my cereal, and I would think as a mom there would be a worry that one would confuse, say, baby wipes and clorox wipes, or baby powder and boric acid...although hopefully nobody keeps baby powder and boric acid next to each other).

Steph's birthday is tomorrow and more so than any other year I know she is in awe of what changes the last year has brought.  To wrap marriage and a new baby in the same year just seems, perhaps, to be an overabundance of blessing.  How does a heart grow that much love in twelve months? And how do you embrace it on 3 hours of sleep?

Stephanie, you are the best of women and the best of friends.  You are everything a son could want in his Mama: strong, brilliant, beautiful, full of smiles, quick to tell you when you're wrong, and quick to cushion that hard truth with kisses.  You love well and gently, and your son already knows and cherishes that in you.  I hope your birthday is full of baby snuggling, naps, and cake.  And I pray the next year is full of marvels, both at motherhood's gifts and life's penchant for surprises.  You have hugged and loved me through three years of law school and beyond, and mothered Kat and I through any number of heartaches, frustrations, and joyous moments.  You have practiced motherhood as an awesome aunt and loving stepmom.  You've been a mama-to-be for years, and now it's a joy to see you embrace it with your own bundle of slobbering, gurgling, burping babyness.

Love you, lady!  Happy Birthday!

Tylenol Moments

There are multiple levels of friendship.  Upgrades and downgrades dependent on your comfort, length of acquaintance, how much you've had to drink.  These things ebb and flow, to be sure, but I've always been pretty careful to create and maintain a solid group of top level friendships and a copious number of mid level relationships to keep things interesting.  I'm an extrovert, and like all extroverts, I thrive on the creation of new relationships, new inside jokes, new dependencies, new shared experience. I seek out such things and have no trouble, in general, in forming a tight knit family of friends.

It has been harder for me in Minnesota, however, than anywhere I have ever lived.  I made friends faster with locals in Morocco, where my language skills were embarassing and my country of origin occasionally offensive, than I have in my new home.  I credit that in part to cultural differences and the habits of life in this  Upper Midwest city.  Many people I met here were from here.  Maybe they moved away for a chunk of time, but they always came back.  That is high praise, of course, for the city itself.  But that kind of experience means you have everything in common with 85% of other young Minnesotans who also grew up in Apple Valley, Golden Valley, Pick A Valley, etc., and nothing in common with a girl who thinks 40 degrees is cold and inserts "y'all" and "mercy" and "heavens" in more scenarios than most Minnesotans would think possible.

I don't know how a non-Upper Midwestern introvert would survive here.  I at least have the benefit of brazen presumption of awesomehood.  I am an excellent friend.  I make excellent cookies.  I tell good stories.  I'm funny.  I can assure you that you will want to be my friend.  And that confidence worked in my favor up here.  I don't want to admit to how many times I invited myself along to various events in conversations I wasn't wholly a part of.  But that "Hi, I'm Rachel. I'm not from here. Does the snow ever melt? Want to be my friend?" attitude eventually did win me friendships, or opportunities for friendships. 

But it has still taken time, lots of time, to build friendships that feel important. It always takes time to connect to someone, but without the daily warzone of law school or Peace Corps or college, the progress is much slower.  I have a handful of friends who I care for deeply and I think the feeling is mutual.  It has been a long time coming but a tiny moment of friendship flashed upon me tonight that I wanted to record for posterity.  It's a really silly, simple thing. 

Nice, somewhat cursory friendships are comfy and quick to invite you to a movie.  There's no risk there.  Sometimes they might even ask you out to dinner, or maybe over for a party.  It's only with time that cursory, maybe accidental friendships build a foundation of habit and comfort that stand up to the more mundane favors of life.  I met my current Bible Study coleader maybe 18 months ago.  We were tossed together for co-leading purposes strictly due to our living in the same part of town and being available at similar times.  We didn't know each other exceptionally well at the time and I imagine we both were hopeful and trusting that God had the nuts and bolts figured out on how our personalities would jive.  In coleading with Dan over the last two years I've found him to be a kind, solid soul with a remarkable thirst for knowledge and laughter.  He's a dear friend.  Important.

Tonight he called me around 8 p.m., sounding like a lukewarm cup of death.  And in the exhausted voice of someone desperate for a coma, he asked if I by any chance had some Tylenol PM on hand. Poor kid.  I drove it over, felt his forehead, told him he had a temp and needed to go to bed. He agreed and I hope he's completely knocked out as I write this.  He thanked me and I wished him happy, health-improving dreams.

 As I was driving away, I was happy to have been there. Happy to have felt his forehead, happy he was tucking in with a bit of comfort (though drug-induced). But mostly I was simply happy he'd asked me for help. His friend.  It's the simple exchanges that communicate the most.  The movies and dinners and parties are so forgettable. The grand gestures so rarely happen.  But an extra pillow for an unexpected guest. The swapping of books because you both love Austen. The I'm-in-the-neighborhood-drop-in-for-tea. The pained request for Tylenol.  They're what real friends do. Not mid level friends.  Not the superficial ones. 

Real Friends bring Tylenol.  And Real Friends ask for it.

Molly's Walkin'

My lovely friend, Molly, is raising funds for the Komen 3-day walk in memory of her mother.  Molly's one of my dearest friends up here and I'm very proud of her excitement and courage in attempting an exhausting ordeal for the sake of all those who have been and will be diagnosed with breast cancer.  Sadly, Molly's story and her loss are not unique, but I believe her desire to spread awareness and optimism is a testament to her mother's grit and the grace of God.

Please take a moment to check out Molly's new blog page, which will detail her training and fundraising efforts.  Share the link with any and all who might be inspired to donate and I'll keep you posted on her progress (I'm expecting to share in some long training walks this summer). Go get 'em, girly!

Molly's Blog