luuuhhhrrve

This is something: I do not hate Valentines Day.

I am currently unattached and that is what it is. I mean, do I love being single? Sometimes, honestly, yes. Like when I want to watch Friday Night Lights for hours on end, I have no one to answer to. Other lots of times, no. Like when I can't find anyone to go with me to an event and a significant other would have to because they love me or something and it's my understanding that's how things work. I don't know, but either way, a day of love-focus is not something I frown upon. We should probably have more of them, in fact. And regardless of your opinion of the contrived nature of the Hallmark-induced holiday and how ridiculous it is that we all buy into the commercialism etc etc and so on and so forth, I mean, I just don't care that much. It's a silly holiday. If you're in love, celebrate it. If you're not, celebrate the other ways that love is all up in your life. If you want to cry into a wine bottle on your couch with the shades drawn watching Nicholas Sparks movies all day because you're not spending tonight at an Olive Garden reinacting the Bella Notte scene from Lady and the Tramp, I guess that's your prerogative. But I do so wholeheartedly wish you wouldn't.

What I won't do is bombard you with platitudes and clichés because then I would have to hate me, and I'm quite partial to liking me. But just because your life in no way resembles a Rom Com at this moment in time, doesn't mean you don't have a love story. It just looks different. It's unfolding, if you will. In process, or whatever. My life is full of love. It is a gift that is at once and the same time both excruciating and delicious; it means my heart is wrenched beyond what I think it can bear but it also means it is full beyond my own capacities. I am given opportunities to love all over every single day and even when I don't take those opportunities, even when I really suck at love, I wake up again the next morning and there are more chances, more opportunities, and I am refilled with love to give. Like magic.

And you know what? I'm ok, and I'm glad I'm ok, but it doesn't mean I don't wonder. It doesn't mean I don't hope. It doesn't mean I don't want. And while it would be nice if you were here already, I've got plenty to do until you get here so I'm sure I won't get bored. See you when I see you.

Maybe right now love feels scarce. But I promise you. It's not.

unicorns.

I know it's been done, but it's a classic. And everything else I tried to write about love for this, the day of love, turned out weird. So here we are, talking about unicorns again. Sorry I'm not sorry.

Having a blog is a little bit like writing an ongoing novel about myself. I write my life, that is true - but I am fully in control of what about my life I write. It is a great thing that I can be real and authentic and write truth... to the extent that I see fit on a given day. The truth is the truth, but I can spin it how I like. I get to choose. When it comes to my life on paper, I am the author, creator, editor, and mastermind. I can write something completely untrue if I want (I don't do that, for the record). I can write something and delete it if I don't like what I see. I'm in charge. I have control. And for your information, yes, the weather is lovely in delusionland.

In the life that I write, I try very hard not to write about the L bomb. Love.

I mean love... like, LOVE love. Romance love. The subject of every movie geared towards my demographic love. DOYOULIKEME check-yes-or-no love. It's not a subject I feel super comfortable positing my opinions on. On the one hand, to be a single girl in her mid-twenties writing about love feels stereotypical to me, and heaven forbid I be predictable. But admittedly, I also secretly fear becoming that girl - the one who talks about nothing but. It is possible, however, that my refusal to accept this topic has caused me to err on the side of never acknowledging it, which is a kind of predictability in itself. Foiled again.

Which brings me to the topic at hand: Unicorns.

Yes. Unicorns. Those mythically wondrous sparkly horse-like creatures with horns growing triumphantly from their majestic brows. Sunlight beaming from every inch of their lithe, irridescent bodies. Unicorns. The concept of the Unicorn is wonderful (don't argue, I won't listen) and magical but at the end of the day, we don't think they really exist. Which is why one day, when speaking of a friend's fiancé, another friend and I dubbed this particular man a Unicorn. He was so great that we weren't sure he was real. Then other good guys showed up. Again and again, we thought, "is this real?!" Years have passed since we first coined this phrase, and one by one, Unicorns have continued to strut into the picture of our lives. Fascinating.

I can no longer pretend that Unicorns (the man kind, anyway) do not exist. The evidence is there, albeit sporadic, and I can ignore their existence no longer. I'm going to resist the urge to go all Nicholas Sparks on you, to shower you with platitudes and cliches, because then I would have to hate me and I'm quite partial to liking me. And I will add as a caveat that while these love-type things are indeed possible, they rarely look like we think they will. The timing we have in our heads is never accurate. There is the potential for a lot of heartbreak on the way there. And while I don't believe in "but even after all that they found each other and they lived happily ever after and nothing bad ever happened ever again because they were both beautiful and in LOVE" Disney fairytale ish, I do believe in Unicorns. Which, if you know me, is a big deal for me to admit.

Since we, the ladies, first gazed longingly into the eyes of Jonathan Taylor Thomas on the shiny pages of Teen Beat and discovered True Love at the tender age of 11, we have hoped (some of us more quietly than others) that Unicorns were real. I just want you to know, girls, that I'm starting to think it might be possible. You need not settle for horses that will kick you right in the teeth if you let yourself get close enough. (To be fair, I've never really liked horses so they didn't stand a chance in this metaphor.) Quit hanging out with horses. Hold out for a Unicorn.

And boys - I'm not trying to be insulting, so before you get your boxer briefs in a bunch, listen up. You, too, can (and probably will) be someone's Unicorn. Rather, you get to be someone's Unicorn. Yes. I've seen it happen too many times not to believe it's possible. We're waiting for you with eager anticipation. I think I may already know some of you and that is equally encouraging. Thank you for being so swell already. Thank you for acting Unicornly to me even though you aren't necessarily my Unicorn. You may be the rarest of rare.

choosing something different

Apparently, I have been in a funk. This was news to me.

I knew January wasn't going well. And I mean, I had my suspicions that I wasn't pulling it off like I thought I was, but earlier this week my suspicion was confirmed. Someone was talking about me, but the person they described (with truly loving, caring words) was a harried, stressy, mess of a human. And I was a little lot distraught. Are they talking about me? No. Well, maybe. Here is a fun fact about me: my bedroom is a window to my soul. And as such, it serves as a sort of barometer for the state of my life at any given time - and on that particular day, that is what I saw. Shoot.

Anyway, it's never fun to realize that you've not been faking it quite as well as you thought you were. The next day, in hopes of proving I am not, in fact, a disaster, I intentionally straightened my hair and put a little more effort into my morning routine... and about 17 different people told me how good I looked. I chatted a little more and ran around a little less. Someone actually said, "2011 Megan is back!" It was kind of a joke, also maybe kind of not a joke. Pretty sure the January funk = confirmed. And then some.

So I'm making a choice. A choice to not be overwhelmed and flustered and stressy. A choice to calm down a little bit and say yes to more fun things and no to more not-fun things and straighten my hair more often, apparently, because it's a big hit with pretty much everyone. I'm going to not let bitterness grow in me [I will not let you leave that legacy], no matter how many tornadoes* I come in contact with. I know that sometimes moods aren't a choice; after all, I don't remember making a choice to be miserable for a month. But I do think that sometimes you do get the opportunity make choices. And if things aren't working and you know you can do something about it, you're sort of obligated to at least try. Right?

At a very opportune time, apparently, I was reminded this week by a clever, likable guy I know of the the Choose Your Own Adventure books. I loved them growing up - Journey Under the Sea was my favorite, if I remember correctly. Here's how it worked: you would get to a certain point in the story, and you would get to make a choice. Do you want the submarine to go through the secret passageway (turn to page 47!), or back up to the surface for fuel and provisions (turn to page 29!)? From there, all you could do was hold your breath, turn the page, and pray that your choice didn't make the story end. It was pointed out to me that life is sort of like this. We are given choices to make, and based on our choice the story will go one way or the other.

I want to live a good story. One that's entertaining and fun and meaningful and true and free. January was not those things very often. And I have a choice, now, to either do what I've been doing and keep feeling yucky, or try my darnedest to do something different. Today on my way home I stopped at a store and you know what I did? I bought a coffee mug with a mustache on it. Not for any reason other than I thought it would be a stupid little thing that would make me happy in the morning. 

January, you did not work for me. So I'm choosing something different. I've already started. Some days it will be as simple as a mug with a mustache on it, but even on those days, I will still be choosing entertaining, fun, meaningful, true, free. Because it's my story, and I can do that if I want.

So there.

*official theme song of my big mood-switch. you're welcome.

thrifting is redemptive

I have always envied people who thrift well. You've met at least one of them, I bet. You say, "oh my gosh I love your totally unique and vintage looking shirt/bag/end table/necklace/artwork/sweater set! Wherever did you happen upon such an awesome item?"

Their answer is always annoying: "Oh this? Goodwill/ARC/Savers/The DAV."

It's a skill, I think, and one that I've thought for a long time that I don't have. But recently I hit my stride. I walked into Goodwill with big dreams and I walked out with a cartful of treasures. I can't remember the last time I was so pleased with myself. I think it had something to do with karaoke? Either way. This was a good feeling.

I can't believe it took me so long to figure this out. I think the whole idea behind it - behind purchasing something that someone once already purchased and loved and is done with - is lovely. Because you take something that's been around the block a time or two. Something that's been used and loved and let go and used and loved and let go and maybe held on to in memory or spirit, but even then, let go. Something that is beautiful in its wornness, lovely in it's usedness, potential-full in it's wear and tear. And that thing - it can be turned into something entirely different, if you want it to. A beat up old frame can house a new family portrait or can be loved again as trendy wall art. A plate can be repurposed as a cake tray. Anything can be anything else. It is, for all intents and purposes, the same reason I love working with and living among broken people; because redemption is a possibility, for me as much as for them.

Thrifting is redemptive.

And let's be honest. The world is full of stuff. And everything good that exists has more than likely already been bought at least once anyway. Why waste good money on buying it again when you can have the one that other lady already bought once for the low, low price of $2.49 and half off of THAT with a pink sticker on it? I'm just saying.

I am a little booknerd: The Hunger Games

I love reading. I'm an unapologetic nerd when it comes to books and I'm sorry I'm not sorry. I'm almost positive it's hereditary, in which case I'm doomed. I just finished reading The Hunger Games Trilogy - like, 6 minutes ago - and I must say, for adolescent literature, it did not disappoint. I just love getting caught up in a book [or in this case, three books] and feeling like the world needs to stop so I can keep reading. I love being so enthralled in a story that I can't make myself go to sleep even though my eyes are fighting with me. I even sort of love that all day today I could barely focus on anything other than the last third of the last book waiting for me on my nightstand. Both hours of The Bachelor were even hard to get through, you guys, which is saying something, because I love The Bachelor.

That's how I know a book was good. Well, there are a few ways, really.

1. When I am so caught up in it that I have a hard time functioning in the regular world. 
It doesn't happen terribly often and sometimes it's why I don't read as many books as I could, because when I get into a good one it's hard to stop me. It's like when you start watching Mad Men on Netflix and you say, "ok, one more episode," until you've said it so many times that it's nearly 6 AM and you're just really glad in that moment that you don't have a job. Not... that I've ever done that. But really. There are few things more delightful to me than getting wrapped up in a good book. The Hunger Games fed that for me three-fold.

2. When I am so sad it's over that it makes me turn the last few pages slower. 
In the same way I love being enthralled in a good story, I love to hate when it ends. Sometimes I cry. Sometimes I hold off on reading the end as if to delay the inevitable. Sometimes I write a blog about it to deal with it's over-ness. When I finished the seventh Harry Potter I was devastated; thought I would never love again. But that's the tell of a really good novel - when even just through words, through rhetoric and dialogue, you are so attached to and involved in the development of the characters that for a weird little minute it feels like a loss when they're gone. [also - for the record - I am Team Peeta all the way]

3. The writing has got to be good. 
I want adjectives and big words and passion and emotion. I don't care if you have the most interesting story line or M. Night Shyamalan plot twist in the whole wide world. If the writing is lame, the book will be too.

4. No one wants to be a cover-judger, but let's get real, I'm a sucker for a good cover.
Or as my friend Beckie says, we like "sexy books." All three of those hardback badboys are sexy as all get out and will look stupendous out on my shelves for the world to see. [That, friends, is what we in the business like to call a bonafide perk.] Don't hate that.

This is specific to novels, obviously. In fact, if I'm reading another kind of book, say, Christian Inspiration or Self-Help for Women or some other category from the sections in Barnes and Noble you hope no one ever catches you browsing in, my criteria is almost exactly opposite. As in, I know it's good when after I cry through read the first chapter I never, ever want to pick it up again. But I for sure should read the whole thing, like, yesterday. But I digress.

This little trilogy provided a nice little break from reality for the few days it took me to read them. I don't ask for much in a novel, really. Take all my attention while we're involved and make me miss you when you're gone. Then just try to not write like you're texting a 14 year old or writing an online dating profile, slap on a sexy cover, and we'll be in business.

please, someone, manage my case

Don't get me wrong. I am super thrilled, ecstatic even, that I was born with the wherewithal to take care of myself. I'm glad that I have the mental capacities and social skills [most of the time] to take care of my life on my own, without much help. But there are times when, even if I've got all my faculties in working order, I think to myself, I NEED AN ADULT! And I do, you guys, I honestly do. And those are the times that I wish that I, a case manager, could have one of me. My own personal case manager/assistant/stand-in adult. I wouldn't hate it, that's all I'm saying.

Here are some of the things I would require of my me if I had one.

+ Remind me to get my prescriptions each month. Do I remember to reorder my client's meds every month? Almost always, I do. But once a month I run out of Zyrtec and forget to get more until I am so itchy [I really should probably live in a bubble] that I literally can't take it anymore and finally go the 500 yards from my bedroom to my Walgreens.

+ Remind me to return movies I rent from Redbox within 24 hours. Or, at the very least, within the calendar year - both of which I appear to be constitutionally incapable of.

+ When I need a drivers license, or license plates, or any other item that will require me to go to an awful place like the DMV to get it, please pick me up and take me there. Oh, and remind me to save the money to get the thing I need. Oh, and if I get flustered, feel free to step in and tell the cranky person on the power trip behind the desk to lay off.

+ Make me get a car wash. I am afraid of the car wash. I have severe and irrational anxiety about going to one. I could use a case manager for emotional support and maybe some exposure therapy so I can take care of things like this.

+ Be my payee? I'll give you my check every two weeks and then you can make sure my phone bill, rent, storage unit bill, Visa, etc, all get paid on time. Then you can give me whatever's left for my personal needs and I won't spend any more than that ever because you won't let me.

+ Remind me to send birthday acknowledgments in a timely fashion.

+ Remind me that I like talking to my out-of-town friends and it would behoove me to call them.

+ Remind me that I don't want to do something every night of the week, so scheduling my life in such a fashion is going to cause me extra/unnecessary anxiety/tiredness.

-- Actually, can you just schedule things for me? That would be nice, since I can't seem to remember to not schedule counseling on the one Wednesday a month when I have book club. You'd think I learned my lesson when I double booked it the first time with both small group AND watching The Bachelor.

+ Help me be on time to things. Wake me up in the morning. Enforce a bedtime. Time, in general? Not my forte.

+ Tell me when I'm making bad choices. Or when I've made one, point it out. Or when I'm about to make one I've already made before, remind me about the time I made it before and how badly it went for me that time. I seem to lack the ability to do that for myself.

+ Oh, and maybe let me know that when I've eaten broccoli and popcorn for dinner not once but twice, it's time to go to the grocery store. Actually, wanna drive me there?

When it's someone else's life [like my clients] I can do stuff. Not all of that stuff, because that's more the work of a personal assistant/slave than a case manager in most cases. But still. Probably instead of whining that I need a servant I should just do what normal people do; make a list of New Year's resolutions and get on it.

I guess it's just nice to daydream about what it would be like to have someone be a grown up for me every now and then. But alas, I am capable. And I live on a social worker's salary, so I'll have to keep doing things on my own for now. At least until I am rich and/or famous and can hire someone to be responsible for me while I breeze through life renting Redbox movies willy nilly and getting car washes all the time without a care in the world.

That's a reasonable expectation. Right?

on perks

One time, in what will go down in history as one of the best conversations I've ever had with my friend Adam, he asked a few of us a simple question: Would you ever date someone for the perks?

So we're thinking, ok, like, if he's an airline pilot, you could go on trips all the time! Or if he's got a sweet house in the mountains you could go skiing every weekend and not have to sit in traffic all the live-long day. Those kinds of perks. But before we could weigh in, Adam went on, and ohhh, am I glad he did:

You know, like a pizza delivery guy. For the free pizza.

Clearly.

Sometimes I wish, when you met people, you got to see a little list of the perks they come with. Because everyone has perks that you can't necessarily see at the outset. And what if you don't get to talk to them long enough to find out that their perks are exactly your dream perks! You know what I'm saying. Maybe you're a better person than me and you never think things like this. But I mean, I think it would make dating a whole lot easier, for one thing. And would be, in general, just kind of a fun thing to know about people. No?

It might look like this:

Super fun family! Won free movie tickets for life in a stroke of luck in a drawing at Hallmark once, so you can go to as many movies as you want until the end of time! The Love Language he speaks best is the one you need to receive the most!

or,

Family owns a cruise line! Bakes the best [thing you like best in the world] you'll ever taste in all your life! So good at giving second chances it'll make your head spin! Has a Netflix subscription!

or even,

Seat heaters in the car! Won't even be annoyed when you try on nineteen-ish outfits every time you leave the house! Personal friends with the drummer from [your favorite band]! Will watch The Bachelor with you even though he hates it!

I suppose this might take some/all of the fun out of getting to know people. It's possible. Probably the reason life isn't that way is because it would take away the challenge. Now when we meet someone we've got to stick around long enough to find out what all their lovely bits are. Yes, actually, I think I just talked myself right on out of the perks debate - because perks, by their very definition, are benefits which one is entitled to as a shareholder. Boom. You don't get them right off the bat because there's a requirement on your part. You've got to invest first.

So there it is, then. Perks are there, it's to be sure, everyone's got some. But they are like presents you unwrap over time or a bonus in your paycheck you don't expect. You don't get to have them for nothing, you have to earn them, sort of. You have to stick around long enough - through the days that maybe aren't so fun and maybe some of the less lovely parts - in order to get the benefits. People aren't meant to be easy. They're not meant to be advertised. They're meant to be cherished and earned and unwrapped and delighted in, both for their perks and their not-so-perky parts, too.

So, yeah, it'll be a sweet deal if you've got DVR. And you'll probably thoroughly enjoy my family's affinity for party buses. But mostly I want to know that you'll love me even though I'm late to everything I do and my socks never match. And I bet you want to know I'll stick around even when you get cranky and don't fight fair.

After all, those are the perks we're really after, amiright?

So let's hear it. What kinds of perks are you into? Better yet, what are your perks?

everyone isn't everything

Over the years, I have been fortunate to know some really fabulous people. I have had truly great friends, each one different than the last. Zionsville friends. Collegiate friends. Cul-de-sac friends. 8th grade confirmation class friends. Lake friends. Sigma friends. Beze friends. Intro to Biblical Interpretation friends. Recovery friends. Church friends. Work friends. I've had all kinds of friends and I bet you have too. It's fun to look back on each of them, and what they brought to my life. It's a lovely gift.

Knowing all those people, maybe, like me, you've caught yourself trying to figure out why people are the way they are. Because people are not always peaches. Maybe my most consistent friend is not so very generous and my most generous friend is ever so slightly flaky. Perhaps the nicest person I know is not even a little bit funny. And my most fun friend might be the worst at consoling me when I'm sad. My most honest and genuine friend might also be the one whose words hurt the most often. No one is perfect. No one, I don't care if they are the best of all besties you have ever had in your life, is doing it all right.

The other day I caught myself internally criticizing someone I love dearly for doing a subpar job at something that I am already fully aware is just not their strength. I was right in the middle of being awful and something struck me: everyone isn't everything. 

I can't expect them to be. I'm not, that's for certain, and even though I'm sure the people I am in relationships with sometimes get frustrated with me for who knows what all I do that's frustrating, they're still in relationships with me. They still show up to my birthday parties and take my phone calls and pick me up from the airport. Because on some level they have accepted that I am not everything. That everyone isn't.

And it's fine, it's all fine. I don't need everyone to be everything. And if I live a life in expectation that everyone will be everything - well, I think that will turn out to be a very lonely life for me. I think the best we can hope for is that we meet enough people who are things that we aren't that we can learn from them how to be that thing that they are, if even just a little. I think if we can do that, we don't have to be everything. We'll be us - limited, less-than-everything us - with just the faintest resemblance of everyone we've ever met. And that will be enough.

So instead of focusing on what people aren't, I vote we shift our eyes to what they are. I add caution in that we should not use this as an excuse to become complacent with the things we already are because I think we should learn to be a little more than we are. And on the other end of that spectrum, I vote we not allow ourselves to be treated recklessly; I hope we can recognize those who aren't interested in learning more and let go when the time comes. Because even though you aren't everything, you are you, and that is something worth protecting.

And most of all, let's be gracious to the ones who aren't everything, but who love us with everything they are just the same. Because those, I think, are the keepers.

christmas cards = primitive facebook

I was talking with my dad over my trip to the homeland about Christmas cards. We were going through the list of people we see each year in the cards and how it's nice to get up-to-speed on their lives. He made a comment about how he should get back on the holiday card bandwagon so he could keep up with those people more effectively. In my head I thought: isn't that what Facebook is for? Which is when it occurred to me. Christmas cards are just like Facebook.

I always looked forward to the lovely day on which the very first holiday card arrived. I loved as they stacked up in the card-sleigh, and every time a new batch rolled in I would go through them like they were baseball cards, picking MVP's, laughing at poems written in earnest, crying as I read aloud from a heartfelt letter. We'd see who has dyed their hair since last year and who is living in their mom's basement again and it was great fun. Perhaps something of a horrible exercise in judging books by covers and whatnot, sure, but fun nonetheless.

Then along came Facebook.

See, in the olden times, pre-social media, there were Christmas cards. You'd spend a month of the year receiving small doses of people's lives, pruned to look as pretty as possible. You'd get all caught up on their goings on in their concise anecdotes, to see what is without a doubt the picture they've decided is the best they took all year. But I bet you'd also have a little their life looks so perfect moment of resentment. In that moment you tend to forget that you yourself wrote your card to show off your good parts. You yourself picked that picture of you at the one formal event you attended all year in order maybe to appear more glamorous than you are. These are things our brains forget to remind us when we feel the pang of low self-esteem at those whose lives seem prettier than ours on holiday-themed cardstock. We're all a bunch of [carefully wording, photoshopping] liars.

So Facebook, I'm pretty sure, would be the equivalent of if every single day of the year from every single person you have ever known you got an upbeat holiday blurb and the very best picture of them they could locate. It's like constantly being beaten over the head with other people's success and good fortune. Where before we got one little mini update once a year and that was enough, at the present moment I think we are significantly too aware of what everyone is up to, all the time. I think it's not terribly healthy.

And talk about a horrible exercise in judging books by their covers and whatnot. Woof. It's no wonder we're sent into a tizzy when someone posts a bad picture of us or when we tipsy-post something we shouldn't have. Within moments we'll know if someone Likes it. Maybe someone'll comment something sassy or reproachful and we'll feel ashamed. Maybe as the minutes and hours pass, no one will say anything. That's the Facebook kiss of death. That's like someone calling right after the holidays and telling you, "oh I got your card this year" but not saying whether they liked it or not. You're left to wonder, and likely you'll assume the worst. You'll berate yourself for not including the picture of that one day your hair looked really not like a lion's mane, or mentioning all that volunteer work you're doing. Better luck next year.

We should all try harder to not get sucked into the holiday card game. To recall that while that girls' profile picture makes her look like a supermodel, mine is from the one day I intentionally dressed up for the specific purpose of getting my picture taken and the other 364 days of the year I was probably wearing my sorority sweatshirt with the puff paint stain or one of it's siblings, like the softball hoodie I stole from my high school. I've had people at the worst times in my whole life tell me, based on my Facebook, that "your life seems so great," or it "looks like you're having so much fun," or they "just love to read your statuses because they're always so happy."

Facebook, much like a Christmas Card, isn't a full picture of reality.
It's just a happy snapshot of a normal, messy life.

Emmanuel, Barnabas?

[Another repost? Yes. Because I thought about writing a Christmas post and this all still feels true and relevant and lovely. So a revised repost it is. Merry Christmas readers!!]

I grew up with the Amy Grant & Mariah Carey Christmas CD's as staples for the month of December. I remember that on the day after Thanksgiving, Mom would drive Thomas and I to Kansas City to see Nana, etc, and it was on that day each year that we broke out the Christmas tunes. I would sing "All I Want for Christmas is yoooooou baaaaaaaby" until my throat hurt. I really like music in general, and I really like that Christmas music is only for a special period of time once a year. Nothing makes me crave something quite like telling me I can only have it for a month of the year does.

Just as a funny aside, when I was a wee one, I loved the Amy Grant version of "Emmanuel, God With Us." The trick is, I genuinely thought for most of my childhood that the words were "Emmanuel, Barnabas." (Before you judge me, sing it. It sounds right.) I can just hear me, 9ish years old, singing my little heart out. And I can just hear Thomas, 3 years my junior and know-it-all-y as can be, "ARE YOU SAYING BARNABAS? Mooooom, listen! Megan thinks its Barnabas!!!" Then I probably hit him and we both more than likely cried, but I'm just guessing here.

Not much has changed about much, including the fact that I often am mistaken about the meaning of things. (And Thom is usually there to correct me, but that's another story for another time.) Now, I can't say I've ever really been searching for the "meaning of Christmas," at least not the way they do in Lifetime Original Movies or Hallmark specials, but nevertheless, I think I finally get it. I think this is a big deal. Really big, actually. Bigger than I have words to describe, in fact, which is the kind of thing that I find at once both frustrating and delightful.

In church last Sunday we talked about Emmanuel. Just like I once thought Amy Grant was singing about a guy with a funny name, I don't think I really understood Emmanuel until last Sunday. The concept that God is here, with us, is hard. Lots of bad things happen. God is there? It is hard for me to believe that in the past two years of loss and suck that God was here. In the past week, even, God was there? I hear so many people cry out in their pain, where is God? Why hasn't God shown up? It was pointed out that more often than not, those words are uttered as a question, in desperation. Far less often are we sure of it.

Christmas doesn't just bring the answer to those, our most personal pleading - it is the answer. Baby Jesus is Good News. He shall be called Emmanuel, which means "God with us." The babe didn't erase our pain or guarantee us a life free from sadness, loss, rejection, hurt, loneliness, addiction, anger, or resentment; which I think sometimes is what I expect "God is here" to look like. But alas, Christmas doesn't signify that we won't have to deal with that stuff. And really, how much more powerful - personal - is a God who does not remove our pain but steps right into it with us. Sometimes I wonder if asking the question of why God lets bad things happen isn't a little like asking what the color blue tastes like. That's not really the point, is it, so there isn't really going to be a satisfactory answer. I don't know. Some days this makes more sense to me than others, but right now, I feel it in my very bones. Emmanuel is not a question. It is a promise that's been kept.

There are times, not often mind you, when I get a feeling that I like so much that I wish I could bottle it up and give it away. I don't mean to imply that I have a monopoly on warm fuzzies or that you are not capable of getting it yourself. Probably even more, I'd like to save it for myself on the days when my bones feel less sure of things. I want to take it off like a jacket and give it to the people I know who feel sure of nothing right now other than that life is hard, because I have been there and it was awful.

It is possible that being there was the only way I could get to this place, though, this truth. It is possible that I had to be there in order to really, finally, fully feel the peace I felt last Sunday when I heard that God is here.

Here.
It's not a question, it's an answer.

things that don't have faces

I decided to revisit and revise this previously posted post, because today was a hard day. And I wondered for a minute, when I got home tonight, just why it was so hard. And then I realized: I've had this job for 7 months. Mental illness has faces. 

Kids are funny, and my nephew Timmy is one of the cleverest. I find that when he doesn't want to do something, he can usually come up with a pretty good reason that he can't. Once, another little boy wanted Timmy to play with a worm. Clay held up the worm and Timmy told him, regretfully, "oh, I can't. I'm not allowed to touch things that don't have faces."

Besides that this may very well be my favorite sentence of all time, what an interesting thought that is.
Things that don't have faces.

As an aside, it is cold. This morning when I got in my car, it was -13. Degrees. Fahrenheit. Given my personality it may not shock you to learn that I rarely check the weather. As such, I often leave the house wearing inappropriate footwear, and sometimes I walk out my back door in the morning and step into a winter wonderland when I didn't even know it was supposed to snow. But on Sunday at the food bank I had so many people alert me to the weather that this time, I knew it was coming. We prayed a lot this Sunday about the impending temperature drop. We prayed for jobs to come through so that they could afford a motel room for a couple of days, things like that. A mere 48 hours later I walked out of the gym and the sweat in my hair froze. It was in that frigid moment that I started to really worry about those who wouldn't have a place to sleep when it was in the negative teens.

I have to admit that I haven't worried much about this in the past. It's never bothered me to the extent that it did yesterday, anyway. And I felt like such a jerk because it was the first day I worried about it, but it was far from the first time people had been homeless in subzero temperatures. I felt selfish and ignorant and hypocritical. But maybe it isn't that I was a soulless human being before yesterday (fingers crossed). Maybe it's just that this time when it struck me that people would be without homes in this disgusting cold, it didn't just look like a special on the evening news; it looked like people I hugged and laughed with not two days ago. It's not that I've never had compassion for people sleeping on the street, it's just that now, homelessness has faces.

It's sometimes hard to really understand things that are beyond the realm of our experience, because those things don't yet have faces for us. It's not that I don't care or don't see it before, it's just a different, more wholehearted kind of care and sight after. Giving pain a face makes it real-er. And when something gets real for us, I don't think we need to be embarrassed because we didn't get it before. It doesn't mean we're heartless, just so very limited.

I didn't have much empathy for addiction until it had names and stories, until they were in my family, until I saw my own face in theirs. Maybe divorce is just a statistic until your best friend gets one. If you come back from Africa and suddenly can't talk about anything but, it doesn't mean you're going through an "Africa phase" or that your concern is a fad. It's that now, Africa has faces. Maybe you never felt the need to speak out against derogatory slurs until homosexuality was a friend you dearly loved and mentally handicapped was the sweet kid holding your hand tightly at Young Life camp. Suicide didn't hurt until it was someone I'd gotten accustomed to seeing all the time. When I heard about Penn State I had to close my office door and cry for a longer time than I even expected, because child abuse has faces. I didn't often think about cancer until it bulldozed my family, and now even hearing the word hurts. And I didn't pray much about people sleeping on the streets until sleeping on the streets had faces.

My stomach was in knots as I tried to pray over every name I could think of. But through the knots there was a whisper of truth and with it, a sigh of relief: it didn't matter if I knew their names because Jesus knows their faces. God knows each of our faces. We are all faces, names, stories, children, and the knots that I feel over the names I know is nothing compared to the love, compassion, and pain that Jesus feels for us and with us. And while I can't begin to wrap my mind around bad things, while I feel completely blindsided in the face of tragedy, at the end of the day I believe that God is big, bigger than any of it. And Jesus is so personal that the smallness of him can seem almost counterintuitive. I believe he knows your face and my face and the faces of everyone I just mentioned and then some. The very hairs on our heads are numbered. If even just one of us is lost, he knows it, and he comes looking.

I chose this profession. I've picked a life with people, and as I've mentioned before, some days it's hard. Today was harder than most. Maybe this whole face thing is another part of why we're meant to be together, in community, taking care of each other - so that when the horrible days show up, we're not alone. So that we can catch a glimpse of the immensity of the tenderness of God. When we feel the knots (that come, inevitably, with community), I believe it's a reminder that God is big enough to be powerful and small enough to be personal. What a lovely juxtaposition.

Even though it means we have to feel heartbroken sometimes, may our hearts keep right on breaking for the things that break God's heart. Let us [continue to] see faces.

santa is a party clown

I continue to posit over and over that my niece and nephew are the funniest kids on the planet. And though she doesn't get nearly enough press on here, my big sister Amie is a kickass mom, and when it comes right down to it, that's why her kids are so cool. And you know I mean it because I said the a-money-money word and I rarely do that in so public a forum. But Amie is so great that she warrants a public swear every now and then. As big sisters go, I really hit the jackpot with mine. Little sister was a role I got comfortable with later in life, when I was maybe not so little, but it's hands-down one of my favorites. And as you can see, just because you're an adult doesn't mean you don't still think your big sisters are the best dressed and coolest ever. For many years I was fairly focused on maintaining my position as bossy elder sister to Ben & Thomas [sorry dudes], so I am experiencing little sister syndrome late in life. So good.

Anyway, for sure Timmy and Shelbie are smarter than me. I'm sure of it, because they are constantly saying things that make my internal dialogue go something like this: I knew that. Right? I did, didn't I? Surely... I must have... They say things that are so funny and profound all at once that it's hard to fully wrap my mind around it. Given their track record, I wasn't that surprised when Timmy said to Amie the other day, about Christmas, the following:

"So, is Santa like a clown for Jesus' birthday?"

[are. you. kidding. me.]

Today I spent more time trying to come up with a Christmas list than I did thinking about Jesus. I'm embarrassed about it, but it's the truth. And that's what Timmy was getting at when he said that to my sister.

"Jesus is what's important, right?"
"Santa is fun but Jesus is the big deal, right?"
"This party is really for Jesus, right?"

Whether he knew it or not, with that little question, Timmy hit a pretty hard theological nerve. For me at least. Because I think no matter how good you are, no matter how much you love Jesus and how well you evangelize and how many seminary degrees you have - yes, even for you - there may come a moment where you're so caught up with the clown that you forget about the real reason for the party. There are moments when things that are not the point take the spotlight over the real reason we're celebrating. When our focus goes to gifts that are shiny and tangible. When we gloss over the gifts that make our souls more beautiful, not so much our wardrobes.

Clowns aren't bad. They're fun, so long as they're not starring in a horror movie. But if you're at a birthday party, you don't fawn over the clown, do you? You don't tell the clown how much you love it, right, how glad you are it was born? Unless, of course, it's a clown's birthday... but let's forget that as an option or my whole analogy is shot. My point is this: instead of spending the holiday season focusing on frivolous entertainment, on Santa Claus and Christmas lists and peppermint mochas and the Mariah Carey Christmas album, I hope that we can all [myself perhaps most of all] heed Timmy's warning and not lose sight of what we're celebrating.

Because this party is really for Jesus.

everything is fine

I'm sitting in a 24-hour coffee shop which is right next door to a Cash For Gold establishment. I like this place because there are books everywhere and a piano and not many people and it's a little weird, maybe, but then again so am I, maybe. I came over here straight from recovery group, R@W, where I was just tonight whining about the fact that it seems like nothing is happening in my life right now. I'm bored. I catch up with people and I have nothing new to report, and it's annoying. I'm ready for some excitement and it seems like the readier I get, the less excitement seems to come. The guy making coffee remembers me from last week, so that's something I guess. Maybe I'll be a regular here. Or maybe the Cash For Gold sign is too bright, shining in my eyes. Hard to say.

But now I'm sitting here. I'm listening to Belle & Sebastian, at the moment. It's a song I don't really like, but I don't want to waste a Pandora skip just yet, so I'm hanging in there. There, finally, it's over. And another crappy song has taken it's place, but for some reason I haven't changed the channel yet and honestly I probably won't, for no particular reason. Maybe things will turn around, if I use a skip? Eva Cassidy. Yes please. I am g-chatting with my brother, and I am laughing out loud because he is being funny. And he is in a Starbucks hours and hours to the east of me, laughing out loud because I too am being funny. The girls across from me are obviously horrified, but I'd be lying if I said I cared. I wonder if my brother is as unconcerned with the judgment of the banjo-playing transient he's sharing a table with. I'll have to ask.

And it just struck me -

nasty old chai tea taste in my mouth, another crappy song on Pandora, writing things and talking on the phone intermittently and getting judged by girls wearing too much eyeliner for laughing out loud in public, still a little in disbelief that a real-live author posted my writing on her blog, my eyes are getting sleepy and now I'm antsy to leave because I remember I'm going to finish my book tonight

- that I'm just fine.

It may not be exciting, today. But everything is fine.

remember that time I online dated?

There comes a time in every writer's life, I think, where funny has to trump embarrassing. Where no matter how much you don't want people to know you did something, it's too good not to share with the world. That time, for me, is today.

A while back I found myself in kind of a pickle. A jam, if you will. Other foods that come in jars maybe, too, I'm not sure. For one thing, I was becoming acutely aware that I suck at dating. I'm good at a lot of things, but dating is just not one of those things. For the other thing, I was stuck in a pattern of spending a lot of energy on unproductive... situations. Yes, that is an accurately vague word to describe bad news boys. So in a moment of weakness, curiosity, and boredom, I did something I swore I would not do. At least not until my mid to late sixties, anyway.

My famous therapist's encouragement ringing in my ears, I precariously entered my credit card number, THEREBY entering the forbidden and more than slightly embarrassing land... of online daters. Yes, that's right.

I signed up for a month of Match.com.

I know, I know, I was disappointed in me too. But lucky for you, this experience was, right out of the gate, just absolutely delightful blog fodder. That made it seem less like vulnerability and more like a social experiment, which made me a little less horrified at what I was doing. A little.

Oh, my, you guys, there are some really wretched people on dating websites. And I'm not trying to be judgey or anything, truly, but there are some real weirdies out there! They make choices that truly blow my mind. I mean, you would think that someone who is writing and posting things with the SPECIFIC PURPOSE of trying to convince someone to want to date them would be a little more choosy. But you guys, they aren't.

I went in with an open mind, I assure you I did, but it was hard to maintain that level of acceptance. After the first date - the most awkward and un-fun two hours of my life thus far - I knew that this wasn't going to work out. Going on dates with people you know you're not interested in spending a minute with, let alone a lifetime, is not a fun thing. It's just not. So after that little escapade, I decided to stay away from situations where I would have to spend more than 5 minutes with someone who wasn't even a little bit interesting to me. It was too painful. Which, you may be able to deduce, means I didn't go on very many dates during this monthlong venture.
 
But I did put together a little list of advice for those poor clueless lonelyboys.
And I hope they will heed my warnings:
 
1a. If the first thing that comes to mind when I see your primary photo is "he's for sure in his mom's basement in this pic" then you're in trouble. This means no pictures of you clearly taken by a webcam with you sprawled across the floral comforter that's probably been on your bed since 1996. No thank you.

1b. Oh and also, if the only pictures you have to offer the world wide web are pictures of you by yourself in your bedroom or shirtless in the reflection of your mirror, I'm not going to find that attractive. I'm not going to swoon at your rockin' hot bod, which is clearly what you're hoping I'll focus on. I'm probably going to assume you don't have any friends and rarely leave the aforementioned basement.

2. Maybe don't start an email to a girl who is white [this is an actual direct quote. I copied and pasted for authenticity], "up front and honest, typically I date black... however, I've been trying not to limit the possibilities." Yes, yes, I'm swooning. I'd love to go out with you even though I don't fit the racial profile you typically go for. Your honesty is not at all weird to me. Also, for the record, that guy was also white.

3. If you find yourself typing the words, "Am I too close to social security for you to consider going out with me?" - you probably are.

4. Is there a cat on/around/in the vicinity of your photo? Is the first thing under interests, "my cat"? I'm out. It's over before it began. Our love was doomed from the start.

5. More than once I was matched with someone based on the following criteria only: "Like you, he's not a smoker!" Really? You air 26 success stories per minute on national televison and that's the best criteria you can use to find me love? It's not even fully true, there just wasn't an option for "only sometimes at really low points in my life and I don't plan on divulging that until we're like 10 dates in," now was there? No. No there was not. Thanks for letting me be my whole authentic self, Match.

6. If you're opening sentens is typed as tho u r an orangutan who probly didn't finish 4th grade, I probly am guna twitch a little until I can find the "no" button. Srsly. It's 1 paragraf on a dating websight. Get a proofreeder. Use spelchek. I beg of u. It's not 2 hard, I promiss.

7. likewise if you cant be bothered to use Punctuation or are sporadic and inconsistent with Your capitalizations I might go out with you just so i can have an opportunity to Punch you in the face for your clear hatred of the english Language

8. One guy who emailed me mentioned that he liked to cook. I asked, what was his specialty? This was his response, and I quote: "I am a good cook. I can make anything. For me cooking is a science and I have the skills to cook so all I need is a recipe. I don't know much food science though so I don't create things too much on my own. I like to cook all things. I am not much of a baker though." So wait. It's a science to you, but you don't know much of it? I'm confused on several levels. One of two things is happening here: either this guy is literally a robot, or he is the actual most boring person I've ever interacted with.
 
9. Making 27 comments about "I never know what to say on these things" or "how awkward this is LOL" does not, in fact, make it less awkward.
 
10. If we're out, on a date, and I tell you I don't want gravy fries, please don't embarrass us both by trying to peer pressure me into ordering them while the waiter stands there, awkwardly, probably considering if we'd notice if he just slipped away and avoided this whole situation. Force feeding me food I don't want is not attractive and will not, in fact, lead to us going two-stepping together after our drink, which you had originally hoped for.

So there you have it. There are some normal people on there, I think, they're just... harder to come by, let's say. Lots of people date online. Some people even succeed and get married and live happily ever after and I think that's superb. So while I genuinely see nothing wrong with it and I'm sure some of those people I mentioned are perfectly normal men who simply made bad dating-profile choices, I think I'm done with it for now. I just don't feel great about feeling like my every word, photo, and habit is being judged and analyzed by weirdos using the internetz from their mom's basement.

Someday I'll get better at this whole deal. I mean, I will, right? I will. I think. Either way, I've met too many unicorns to get caught up with robots who "don't know much food science" or two-stepping-gravy-fry-pushers. Plus, maybe some girl out there wants to date a guy who can't spell and loves cats and has an assortment of floral bedspreads. I bet the weirdies are unicorns for someone, too.

I like that, actually. Let's end with that.
On the high note of a low point.

at times most unexpected

I missed you today.

And it never happens when I expect it to, but at times most unexpected, which is tricky. Because instead of being ready for it I'm standing in a store and I see something you'd like. And I think, what a perfect gift! Before my brain has time to catch up, I hold the thing in my hand. I applaud myself again for how much you will love it.

And then I remember.

I prepare for anniversaries, birthdays, holidays, important days. I know they will be sad and I am ready. But I do not prepare myself for walking through a store. I cannot anticipate that I might hear that song you loved. I don't know how to plan for being caught off guard.

That is a hard thing about grief, to be standing in the sale room of a store in a mall holding measuring spoons shaped like fish in my hands and I feel like I can't breathe because I forgot, for a moment, that I cannot buy you presents.

On the other hand, I don't mind that every now and then you are still so present to me that I want to buy you one. That's how I get myself to let go of the fish and walk back out of the sale room and into the mall and so on and so forth; because it is in those moments, in songs and stores and other little pieces of you out there in the big wide world, that I remember how to keep breathing and living and being ok. Because no matter what any of us do or where we go or how well we prepare for any of it, you'll always be there, in those places, with each of us. At times most unexpected.