Fuego!

Part of me wishes our apartment had gone up in flames and we’d lost everything but each other. But only a part of me – the same part that wishes life was more like a lush Victorian novel or an action movie.

The rest of me marvels at the sudden jolts life gives, and melts with gratitude at the practical kindness of our friends.

A reporter’s take on the story I’m about to tell can be found here: (http://www.cbc.ca/canada/british-columbia/story/2009/10/15/bc-east-vancouver-apartment-fire-arson-adanac.html).

That will give you the basic details – I’m writing this post to a) make some sense of things and b) record the human details for posterity and possibly hilarity.

The newsman can’t tell you about the man who ran out in his torn pajamas and bare feet. We all speculated about his dramatic escape, sans pant leg, (was it on fire? Did he tear it off while rushing through the window? Was he just about the faint from the smoke until his girlfriend heroically ripped him free?). His girlfriend nonchalantly pointed out that actually, those are his normal pajamas, sans pant leg.

The newsman also can’t tell you about the guy standing on his ground-floor balcony as his suite filled up with smoke, taking a long drag on his cigarette. Friends screamed at him to get out, to get outside. He looked around, annoyed at the inconvenience, took another puff, and yelled, “I am outside.” Maybe he lit his cigarette on his couch. Now that’s convenient.

Many cats were saved, including one who had the firemen playing a hearty game of “flip the mattress” before they nabbed the feline and tossed it off the balcony.

So. There was a fire in our apartment building on Wednesday night, and since then, Jonathan and I have been staying with an amazing family who are keeping us warm, fed and comforted back into normal, while our apartment languishes without inhabitants, full of things that smell like the ghost of 1,000 campfires.

I wandered through Army and Navy today, and bought some underwear, socks, and an extra shirt for Jonathan. We’re provided for – but it does feel strange and strangely freeing to wear the same outfit every day, because you have no other clothing. (That was not a plea for sympathy or clothes – we’ve had lots of offers, and we’ll be able to get some of our garments back).

We left the dishes in the sink that night, left without supportive undergarments or contact lenses, left clutching the laptop, hard drive and cell phones, left hoping that we’d be back soon and it was all just a drill. But the thick black smoke in the hallways, the sirens and the hysteria of escaping neighbours assured us otherwise.

One of the first things that ran through my mind as we watched our apartment block go up in smoke, was a sincere hope that the mice and the cockroaches I have been battling would finally surrender. Little did I know we’d also be given notice to move out.

That last sentence upsets me – just as I was finally settling into our very humble abode, reconciling myself with its quirks, and loving the neighbourhood, here we are again, in search of a house.

We are not, however, searching for a home. (Here’s the Victorian novel part…)

Over the last 48 hours, denied access (save ten minutes to revisit and rescue essential items and cell-phone chargers) to our house, I know with absolute certainty that my home is my husband. All of our books, our clothes, our dishes, our precious things are out of reach right now, and some may possibly be forever, but my heart burns for none of it.

Instead, I’m full of love for the man who led me calmly out of the building, made me laugh and held me close, and even now assures me that all will be well in the end.

I’m also incredibly grateful for the Swiss family who have welcomed us into their home as naturally as if we’d been planning a long, happy visit anyways, and gave us everything from toothbrushes to hot tea at the site of the disaster.

Home. It’s where the heart is.

The Rambler

Putting one foot in front of the other has been one of my main goals this year – but rarely have I looked up, or stopped to smell the seaweed.

Partly out of necessity (our car has passed on, and the bus is too expensive) and partly out of laziness (wrestling my bike off the balcony for a five minute ride is too much trouble), I’ve been walking to work, and it’s been transforming my health, my spirits and my imagination.

I wear large, colourful and sturdy Fluevog boots for the trek, and just the other day a little girl, dressed in pink, stopped in her tracks as our paths crossed, tugged her grandmother’s sleeve, and shouted “Boots! Boots!”

I’ve had the same experience as that little girl, with sights as insignificant as a cat the colour of concrete, but infinitely softer. Instead of hunching over my bicycle, dodging traffic and conquering hills, I tread slowly along the sidewalk, looking up at everything.

I begin each morning at the crest of Adanac Street with a view that sweeps the city even as I struggle down the ravaged alleyway (it’s anarchist cobblestone made of broken concrete and years of weather damage). Crossing through the small park, I do look down for a bit, to avoid the inevitable dog poo hidden in greenery, and begin my descent to work. I can time my walk by the people that pass, from the old lady gracefully practicing tai chi in the playground, to the man with the cane who waves at me every morning as we cross the road together.

I’ve included some snapshots of the heritage houses and architecture the right hand side of the page, and will take more snapshots as I ramble on, but here are some of the more picturesque things I’ve seen on my walks that photography can’t capture:

- a homeless man sprawled out in glorious slumber on a lawn, in a sleeping bag. The owners of the lawn sit on their porch, drinking tea and letting him snooze in the afternoon sun.

- a clutch of chattering, impossibly slim ladies waiting to be let in to the factory that pumps out hundreds of flavours of gelato so we can all get fat.

-a giant house, three floors, on wooden stilts, awaiting a foundation. The lights are on upstairs, and through the window I can see a family having dinner in peace as their massive home floats above ground.

- a pumpkin vine that transforms a prison-like social housing project into a fairytale scene. The vine curls around a dead tree and reaches into the sky. All that’s needed is Jack.

- platform shoes, left behind in an attempt to scale the fence (I often see bits of clothing, abandoned during the night.)

- the golden cocker spaniel, Charlie, who has bitten the dogwalker only once. The dogwalker forgives him, as he is a cocker spaniel, after all.

- the birch tree by the Russian Orthodox church whose branches frame the late afternoon sun perfectly.

- the couple who sit in their car by the factory every morning at 8:07 am, fingers entwined, talking of things I cannot hear over the noise of traffic.

I keep a mental list of these things – small bits of astonishment and familiarity, that fill my senses and turn a senseless commute into a morning delight. By the time I get to work, I am awake and alive, and by the time I wander home, the day’s worries and cares are left behind me on the trail.

Ramble on!

The Hustler

We have a new truck. Actually, it’s a ‘93 vintage, Nissan pickup with a groovy navy  paint job and the word ‘HUSTLER’ painted on the tailgate. Apparently the folks at Nissan were trying to evoke the success of the AMC Rambler, and some of the more indiscreet meanings of the verb, to hustle, were lost in translation.

Our wine-coloured Ford sedan broke down after getting us almost all the way home from Vernon this summer, so this new vehicle is a godsend. It was cheap, it runs well, and it’ll make our longer commutes less arduous, although the compact cockpit doesn’t quite make my 6′6″ husband very comfortable.

The most important detail about this truck of ours is that it has a standard transmission.

For most drivers, an adventure, and for some, old hat – but for me, the kind of gal that got her license by the skin of her teeth, and then went years without applying that knowledge on the road, the standard transmission is terrifying. Especially in Vancouver’s driving culture, where the cell phone trumps caution every time.

You see, the first question that I asked myself every time I got behind the wheel of our Ford was “What if somebody dies?”  A dear friend of mine once let me drive her car from Abbotsford to Port Coquitlam, a route with two bridges, three separate highways, a ferry, and a whole lot of profanity.  My friend, in her best Saskatchewan drawl, shrieked, “We are all going to die,”  more than once on that particular journey.

But here I am, having mastered the jitters and the over-eager shoulder-checking, getting over the giddy urge to tell cross-town folks that I’m visiting that I DROVE and MADE IT ALL THE WAY BY MYSELF, perfecting my road rage and standard-issue condescension at the terrible parking skills of others, and now I have to learn how to drive a standard?!?!

Seems like a small complaint – but here’s the metaphorical payoff – just when I think I’ve learned something well, especially of the heart, I find myself back at the beginning, albeit via a different entrance.

And I chafe at this constant refinement. I’m an emotional hustler – I like to learn the hard lesson quickly and as painlessly as possible, and then move on. Take my attitude towards marriage, for example. I was kicking myself after the first three months for not knowing everything yet, not knowing my husband well enough, not knowing how to do this marriage thing to perfection. After all, three months is practically an entire semester, and then there’s the final exam, right? After that, you have a degree. A sillier example is grocery shopping – I often wish, as I traverse the aisles, that I could just buy everything needed once, and never have to go back to the store again.

I see this tendency of impatience with one’s own learning curve in my sweet, smart little nephew. We went for ice cream the other evening and I bought him a bowl, and myself a cone. Wrong.

As soon as we sat down, his tiny two year old hands were reaching for my giant cone, and shoving his bowl away. So I let him hold my ice-cream cone, and disaster ensued. His hands were so small and the cone so heavy that he lopped it on the counter, and then in an effort to regain his poise, smashed the top of the cone into his baseball cap brim. The simple fact was that the cone was too big for him – he had to work his way up to it. But he looked around the gelato shop, saw the grown-ups eating delicious cones with aplomb and ease, and stubbornly decided he had to learn how to do the same in one try. The poor little guy got so frustrated, he ended up having no ice cream at all, except for the gobs of it sticking to his raincoat and his favorite yellow hat. Tears and napkins, a distracting lollipop and a quick walk home was that story’s ending.

Life’s most profound lessons are like that, I think. We have to work our way up to them, and when we think we’ve got it down, another layer of knowing challenges us to move even further and deeper.

I have to remind myself of a process more profound, whether I’m in a panic about shifting gears, or devastated at the loss of a friendship that I thought I had mastered.

I have to look to that beautiful verse in the bible, found in the book of Philippians (a letter from Paul, a leader in the early church, to the congregation in Philipi):

“…being confident of this, that He who began a good work in you will carry it out to completion” (Philippians 1:3).

While I want to hustle along through the heart lessons, pass the course and shred the notes, God is interested in getting at my heart and soul through every angle, testing and retesting until the work is full and complete. He’s not content with ‘good enough’ or ‘that will do’ – rather,  He lovingly wants perfection, drawing me patiently towards humble refinement, as a person, as a friend, as a wife, as a worshiper.

So I’m trying to downshift – into patience, into reverence, and into trust. Even in the minutiae of daily life.  I will learn how to drive that darn Hustler, but in my heart, I want to become more of a rambler.

Moving In

As friends unloaded boxes into our tiny new apartment on the first of August, in the withering heat of summer, I planned my escape. I’d just say something about going to get more cleaning supplies (the place was filthy) and drive away. The gloomy hallways, the strange smelling carpet, the piles of stuff that wouldn’t fit could all fade as I drove off into the sunset. The place was a dump.

Every time I climbed the stairs with another box on moving day, I contemplated leaving. Embarrassed by the mounds of stuff that obscured the living room, enduring the disgusted but determined looks of two ladies who chose to stay and scrub like saints, I just wanted to get away, retreat to our spacious, wood-floored, dishwasher equipped apartment and say it had all been a mistake – we were coming back.

But the last box made it off the truck, my husband and I mantled the bed, and we’ve now notched over 30 days in this hovel.

I still haven’t figured out the shower – its mysterious ways leave me hot and cold, and then hot again. The mice have moved out, after causing me some serious morning shocks as I prepared for work. (I’d creep out into the hallway, turn on the lights and hope for no small grey movements).  Two cockroaches have died on the tiled floor, and the rest seem to have retreated in the face of such sudden, shoe-thumping danger. Miniscule ants still populate the bathroom, but they’re so small and rare, it has stopped worrying me. Thankfully, bedbugs are not among our initial roommates, as many Vancouverites are finding out to their horror. (See http://www.bedbugregistry.com if you’d like a creepy crawly experience).

The carpet still lingers in some distant odious past, fresh whiffs of the good old days occasionally assaulting my nose. I billed the landlord for two bottles of Febreze, and intend on purchasing another.

Our clothes spill out of tiny closets, our living room hosts a tower of things without a place, and just this week, our bedroom window lost its will to close properly, leaving us with a constant 1/4in breeze.

Don’t even get me started on the neighbours – suffice to say, if you’re ever banging on a window at 4am for more than 30 minutes, screaming your beloved’s name, chances are, Natalie’s not home.

And then there are the dishes. Once forgotten in the ease of dishwasher heaven, I am at this very moment avoiding the third pass at the single sink as I try to keep the mess at bay.

So why write all this whining? Partly as an update to Moving On, and partly because I am happier than ever about where we live. Our reduced circumstances have actually produced some much-needed light-heartedness, and lightening of our loads.

For example, I’ve gotten rid of three garbage bags full of clothing. It simply didn’t fit. My husband has bravely discarded more of his possessions than he’s ever done “in his whole life” and we’re richer for it. We have more space to breathe, and less stuff to sort.

We wash the dishes together – valuable companion time now that he’s working again – an excuse to connect.

And I don’t have to spend an entire day cleaning the place, feeling guilty about the emptiness, or worrying about all the things we should be doing with such a fabulous apartment: entertaining, decorating, socializing.

Instead, I vacuum, sweep and dust in less than an hour, tidy a little and then enjoy the coziness. I can walk over to my favorite bakery, our romantic stroll down the Drive on our wedding day can be recreated anytime, and getting everywhere by bus is easier than ever.

We live in the back of the building, and this has proved a beautiful trick of the mind, offering a vista of gravel road and two large fir trees that belie the bustling Drive just a few steps away. The sun shines brightly in both our windows, and aside from the garbage truck’s bi-weekly gnashing of teeth, no traffic noise disrupts our sleep.

Our tiny fridge means that I spend less on groceries, and the lack of storage space means that we are wasting less food, instead digging into provisions and cans that have been saved for too long.

And we’re planning a trip to England next summer with our new-found ability to save – spending $500 less per month in rent is a revelation.

I can walk to work in 25 minutes, an activity that has been lifting me out of many a grey morning into alert enjoyment of my surroundings, as well as keeping me fitter than ever.

Best of all, I don’t mind when my saucy two-year old nephew rambles about, spilling juice and cookies on the carpet. Instead of worrying about the floors, I romp alongside him.

We haven’t had any guests yet, other than family, and I’m still working my way up to that day – pictures to be hung, boxes of thrift store items to be gone, a fresh assault of Febreze on the carpet, but it’s looking a lot more like home these days.

Sharing

I got myself into some social hot water recently, upon hearing of a friend’s impending marriage. A passionate soul with a specific career in the making, her husband-to-be told her that he viewed her career as the other man in their relationship. I was outraged by such petty love, and wrote an email that I’m sure still reverberates badly on my reputation for tact and decency.

But alas, when one protests too much, the fault lies often within the heart. And I have been realising lately that I, too, can be a jealous and possessive spouse.

My husband found a job last week, after nine months of searching. It’s not a glamourous return to the world of computers, but rather a friendly face in a board game store.  Working again is a wonderful thing for him – although it means he’ll home late most evenings, and our paths will cross much less often.

I should be thrilled, but having enjoyed our lazy days and honeymoon cocoon, I’m a little perturbed.

Being married to a good man whom is loved by his friends and family is a popular ideal. But such likeablity means there are many other people who want to spend time with him, or involve him in projects, or get his advice.

I first began to wrestle with sharing this man of mine when we were just beginning to fall in love. My life was full, and rich, and I expected that my love would fit seamlessly into it, leaving his friends and interests behind. My insecurity complicated matters – if he had fun without me or had other things drawing his heart, than perhaps he didn’t love me most, or even enough. I, on the other hand, trotted him around to all of my favorite haunts, activities and social events, expecting him to blend quietly into my life as the latest ornament in my collection of cool friends and accomplishments.

I know such thinking is childish and petulant, but I felt it. I even said as much one day, after fighting my own melancholy and pushing past my social insecurities to attend yet another event with him – we sat at tea afterwards, and I told him I wanted him solely for myself. He laughed, pretended to be a cocker spaniel, and asked me where he could chauffeur me too next. Requiring such devotion of another is dangerous – asking them to choose between the good things in their life and your happiness is never a just question. Pitting their love for you against the people or passions of their life is a fight that will end in resentment and bitterness.

To love with an open hand, as a dear friend of mine wisely counselled me to do during my courtship, means to be thrilled when your lover is happy, to support them in their holy and true passions, and to be encouraged when their friends and family are able to enjoy them and bless them. I cannot be everything to my husband, just as he cannot be everything to me.

I was reminded again of the dangers of holding on too tightly on our recent trip to Vernon – my husband’s hometown. We had planned a romantic getaway, where the only company would be the birds and the bees, and some burning trees. I made a small concession to attend church with him before we’d disappear, and that’s where my selfish plans began to crumble.

Lo and behold, most of his childhood friends and family just happened to be in town the same day – from far flung places like Ontario, they all converged that Sunday, and our planned getaway became a big happy reunion.

How could I pout when I saw the joy that carried the next few days – the in-jokes, the reconnections, the lively conversations, the memories. I could see the warming, uplifting effect it had on my husband, who had spent a lonely year battling depression as he looked for work and found none.  To insist that we escape would have been unthinkable. So I laughed along with him, and let myself be social with those that knew my husband well, knew sides of him I have yet to see.

Secretly though, I chafed a little, and hoarded our last day together. I loaded Tuesday down with plans: a picnic, some good wine, a secluded spot. I was thrilled when we finally said goodbye to all and curled up in bed, the fresh morning without any people awaiting us.

Waking up, then, without being able to move my neck, was a painful irony – instead of spending the day gazing at each other (I think my plans had over-ripened into something melodramatic), we spent the day in search of medicine, chiropractors, and ice.  I was crushed – but finally gave up the ghost of my sacred plan, and let the circumstances be as they were. After all, my sweet man ended up tending to me and driving me around all day. What more could I ask for?

Right before we were engaged, I was considering a move to Montreal, the promised land of journalism and adventure for me. My now-husband didn’t say a word – let me come to my own conclusion, although he desperately wanted me to stick around. He maintained then, and maintains now, that my writing, the things that make me hum inside, and the friends who I need to spend more time with, are no threat to our relationship. Instead, he spurs me on to do those things more often, to pursue what makes me feel alive, and in doing, so, draws my thankfulness and love back towards him in the end.

Even the language of love is peppered with possession – “my man,” “I want you,” and “be mine,” but although true moments of wanting and loving involve such desires, I am hoping and praying that my love grows larger and more welcoming the longer we are married – letting the things (like board games and youth group and old friends and family) that make my husband who he is become a welcome addition rather than a personal threat.

As John Donne put it so long ago in his Valediction: Forbidding Mourning:

(my rough translation follows in italics)

Dull sublunary lovers’ love
—Whose soul is sense—cannot admit
Of absence, ’cause it doth remove                                     15
The thing which elemented it.

But we by a love so much refined,
That ourselves know not what it is,
Inter-assurèd of the mind,
Care less, eyes, lips and hands to miss.                           20

Our two souls therefore, which are one,
Though I must go, endure not yet
A breach, but an expansion,
Like gold to aery thinness beat.

If they be two, they are two so                                          25
As stiff twin compasses are two ;
Thy soul, the fix’d foot, makes no show
To move, but doth, if th’ other do.

And though it in the centre sit,
Yet, when the other far doth roam,                                30
It leans, and hearkens after it,
And grows erect, as that comes home.

Such wilt thou be to me, who must,
Like th’ other foot, obliquely run ;
Thy firmness makes my circle just,                                    35
And makes me end where I begun.

(Donne’s language can be a thicket at times – but the basic gist is that his love does not fade when he is away from his lover, instead, their love is stronger and more expansive, allowing, like a drafting compass that draws a circle, the distance to be great between them, all the while they are fixed together deeply at the centre joint. The most easily accessible picture in the poem is that of “gold to airy thinness beat” – as gold doesn’t lose it’s value or integrity, even when it’s shaped and pounded out into thin sheets.)

Anniversary

Come Sunday, my husband and I will have been married a year.

365 days of love, trial and error, laundry, dishes, laughter, awkward and awesome moments, car repairs, evening teas, drama, gourmet meals, getting lost, waking up and walking around this old town together.

I remember the early days, when I was determined to do everything perfectly – set the right patterns together, build a proper life, be the most sensitive, intelligent and intuitive wife ever. Of course, all my best laid plans have been swept off the table. Instead, our first year together has been a raucous, delicious and unpredictable banquet.

How grand – to be shocked by such an old insitution – how marvellous to be surprised out of my single daydreams into a rich life that leads elsewhere.

The year of elsewhere – that’s what this has been. An undoing of the past, from painfully re-arranged friendships (still raw, at best) to dear-held plans for success and comfort, we’ve both been pared down to people that we never imagined we could be, (and still like one another) when we first met. My husband, formerly the successful video game programmer, and myself, the up-and-coming graduate and journalist, are now Mr Unemployed and Mrs Nameless Service Worker.

But in losing our “selves,” we’ve found one another. Sometimes that means one of us is a wreck, in tears, discouraged, or unable to get up in the morning. Other times, that means joyful surprise and a reckless freedom. Aha! my heart often has exclaimed - I knew you could be wonderful, but I didn’t know how deep that went, defying woes about the rent, and the mice, and the bad habits, and the churlish nose-picking moments of selfishness.  We’ve both risen to the occasion.

Many say that the first year is the hardest, but what they don’t tell you is how. For us, our circumstances threatened to devour our happiness, and it’s only been with perseverance and an unwillingness to crumble (although my husband would lovingly joke that I have a particular flair for falling to pieces) that has kept us together. It’s a comforting thought, to know that we’ve weathered long-term job loss, two moves, serious illness, catastrophic automotive breakdowns, familial and friendship drama, and financial hardship, and we are still in love, as well as genuinely liking each other.

So bring it on, year two. We’ll be here waiting for you – together.

Moving On

Our apartment is a mess. Papers that need filing, boxes that need filling, and accumulated possessions that demand a response – “Will you throw me away?” they ask, while I ask them, “How did you get here?”

For the past three weeks, I’ve been on Craigslist like an addict, searching for the perfect apartment. Not out of want, but out of need, all the while battling the loss of a dream about how our first year of marriage was going to be.

The place we love, with the dishwasher, the wood floors, the radiant light, the extra room for family, is no longer affordable – and after a good deal of angst, I am at peace with that. Because life doesn’t offer you an endless lease or guaranteed contract of comfort and happiness. Rent increases, delinquent landlords, unwanted critters, traffic noise and crazy neighbours are all part of the process of making a home for yourself in this wide world, and my husband and I are finding out that such a home is very different from our early, dreamy assumptions.

We just put down our damage deposit on a little apartment, sans dishwasher, sans closet space, but most importantly, sans the expense of our current place. Close to work, close to fresh fruits and vegetables, close to flowers and fresh air – it’s going to be an adventure. We’ll be setting aside the comfortable dream of stable incomes, room for family, extra wine glasses and spacious, graciously appointed rooms for a bohemian nest with wall-to-wall books and no elbow room, but plenty of coziness.

While the possibilities of our new place can be painted as rosy, the preparation for moving on has been all thorns.

How did we manage to own all that we do? When I met my husband, I was working towards owning only enough to fit into a few duffle bags so that I could go anywhere, without baggage. I love shedding things – throwing them away, giving them up, tossing out the misfits. My husband, on the other hand, holds tightly to everything – whether it’s notes from elementary school, or ancient tax forms. He’s the string to my kite, the fixed star to my wandering ways.

So you can imagine that moving is not an easy process. While I toss things out with extravagance, he finds ways and reasons to save them. Moving into a smaller apartment makes our joint packing even more difficult, as I envision a small pathway between the towers of stuff, while he thinks optimistically of extra shelving.

But we’ve been working on it – giving in to one another, kicking aside our differences. We’ve been finding things long forgotten – notes and pictures, past outfits, stories we loved, letters. Seeing more of each other’s lives through the scribblings and certificates and scraps we wanted to hold onto for remembering.

While my husband has been bravely learning to appreciate the gifts of a paper shredder, I’ve been trashing some old ideas and thoughts that have kept me from moving on, and fully into married life. I think I’m still at the ’sorting out’ stage – so bear with me here, as I simply share, and hope that as these things emerge from closets and boxes of the heart to see the light, that they will eventually be put in their proper places.

BOX #1 – The battle for control

I hate to admit this, but letting someone else into your life means letting that great cloud of their memories, their past, their possessions and their junk into your life also. We’ve all seen the common cliche – the husband who has the room in the basement where he can hang his posters and keep that “ugly” old armchair, while the rest of the house looks like a magazine.

I definitely have that tendency to organize in a brutally selfish way that alienates those I love while trying to impress those I don’t know very well. For example, (and I am still apologetic about this) my sister and I shared a room for many years. During that time, I was the self-appointed interior decorator, and in one infamous incident, asked her to throw away all of her stuffed animals and kitsch that didn’t match my new colour scheme. (Sorry, my dear sweet sister).

The love of order came back to haunt me when I helped my husband move his things from his bachelor pad to our apartment last year. We fought over silverware, and instead of compromising, I left him with a lasting impression that given the chance, I would gladly and ruthlessly throw away all of his stuff that I deemed ‘junk.’ That unfortunate impression came to the surface last week during our packing, when I realised that in my zeal to purge our household, I was in fact implying that I didn’t really accept him.

Marriage is hard enough to adjust to – two lives mixing as one and all that complicated jazz – but given the high, rough seas that have threatened our happiness so far (loss of his job, far from his family, a new way of interacting with someone who doesn’t share the complete love of all of his past-times), it was a painful message to hear.

To me, things have always just been things – except maybe for a few special dresses and beloved books – but an observation at work gave me some insight into the damage I was inflicting on my man in my eagerness for order and control.

The most devestating thing you can do to a person who has lost their home, their reputation, and in some cases, their sanity, is take away their possessions. Many people choose to sleep outside instead of in shelters, given the choice of leaving their shopping cart on the street for the birds and thieves. Their whole world is in that shopping cart. It’s all they have left to control. When evictions take place for the sake of renovation, many people simply go over the edge while the news crews look on in pity at the small rooms and bare cupboards. Those small rooms house special talismans of lives lost, precious scraps of memory, that often end up in the dumpster as the police come along to clear the area.

So, I am trying to let go. I will never have a perfectly ordered household. Just wait until the kids arrive. And what might seem like junk to me maybe the only way my husband has to remember a part of his life that he would otherwise forget.

Mind you, we’re good for each other – him to ruffle my feathers while I help him shed his winter coat. (How’s that for a mixed metaphor? It must be that I haven’t written in awhile and haven’t gotten all the literary cheesiness out of my system).

BOX #2 – Instant gratification

Another musty closet idea that has held sway for too long? The entitlement to ‘nice things.’  In letting go of our apartment, I wrestled with a host of assumptions about how my life was going to turn out. Growing up poor, with enterprising and imaginative parents, was a valuable education, but also instilled a secret fear in me that I would end up the same way. Therefore, I have tried my damndest to be successful, to avoid the tragic scene of my husband coming home to tell me he’d lost his job, to run away from the reality that I might have to sacrifice my dreamy plans of sitting at home, writing books, while someone else works at a job they don’t like to pay the bills. I’m embarrassed to admit that – but it’s true.

So when we married, my husband had a lucrative job with full benefits, and we began to build a life to match. We bought lots of toys, and didn’t save anything. I would shop for groceries as if I was feeding ten instead of two, adding every whim to my shopping cart without discretion. “We can afford it” was our general mantra – and when the crunch came, I wasn’t ready for it.

You’d think that a self-respecting East Vancouver girl who grew up without any perks, but lots of love, would have some skill in thrift, but I laid all that aside in pursuit of an expensive apartment, a full wardrobe, and a lavish entertaining menu. After years of school and scrimping, I felt somewhat liberated. I didn’t have to worry anymore about our bank account. I fell fully into extravagance, and loved every minute of it.

So now – when things are pressing in on us, when my dear man is working temporary construction and coming home exhausted while I continue toiling instead of writing. Moving has forced me to look into my closet, and I don’t like what I see.

I spend time thinking about my grandmothers  and my parents these days. And my dear departed friend Lucy, who once told me I’d have to marry a millionaire because of my extravagant ways. (Extravagance defined as using too many tissues, or buying a new pair of shoes simply because I loved them, not because I needed them).

Likely, the lives of my grandmothers and mentors were not romantic when they were young, living through war, depression, personal heartache and lack of food in the cupboards, but I envy their habits and their sensibilities.

Learning to be patient, and satisfied with less, is my new challenge, born out of necessity. I don’t know who told us that we had the right to buy what we wanted, when we wanted it, but it’s not true. Neither is the belief that stuff accumulated can satisfy you. In fact, all the stuff we have now has become a burden, not a blessing. My closet full of dresses doesn’t cure my insecurity – in fact, it mostly complicates the issue, as I have too many choices to consider in the midst of my internal image angst.

And don’t get me started on the seduction of the new – we’d be in a lot better position as a planet if we didn’t want everything to be new, and weren’t too lazy to restore the old and the durable. My dad is especially good at that, both with people, whom he treats with love and respect, no matter their state of togetherness, as well as with things. He’s an expert scavenger, finding treasure in unexpected places, and the free section of the Buy & Sell. He’s also great at transforming things: one year we went up to an abandoned ski hill where the locals sled and play. My dad constructed a sled out of old wood, twine and orange plastic fencing that he’d gathered from the area, and we had a wonderful time. He’s a rescuer in the best sense of the word.

My mother loves pickled pig’s feet – because my grandmother ordered groceries once a year, and those came on a boat. There were no returns or refunds. One year, a barrel of pig’s feet arrived as a mistake order. Suffice to say, they made do, and even though I will never likely enjoy such a delicacy, I intend on making do, and making it a joy as well as a great story to tell my kids.

Moving on from domestic dreams fuelled by an industry of selfishness and love of convienience and order may not be easy, but I’m ready to throw it all out. It’s just a pile of junk that won’t fit into our new apartment, or my heart. I suspect that there’ll be more room then, for some of my lover’s favourite things, and more space for compassion and surrender. Now that’s the kind of place I want to live in.

The Love Chapter

Ten months of being married does not make me an expert – in fact, I feel more aware of my faults and foibles than ever, in this new and unsettling world of being seen in all of my moments.

But as I waited for my husband to come home this weekend, (see Home Alone for more on the subject) I realised that in just a few short months, he has taught me more about love than I ever could see on my own, and I am fundamentally changed by these lessons.

I was reminded tonight of that old lovin’ chapter in 1 Corinthians – you know, the one they read sonorously at weddings.

In a sentence, being married is like rocky road ice cream – bumpy and sweet.

For now, here’s the chapter, translated by Eugene Peterson:

¹If I speak with human eloquence and angelic ecstasy but don’t love, I’m nothing but the creaking of a rusty gate. ²If I speak God’s Word with power, revealing all his mysteries and making everything plain as day, and if I have faith that says to a mountain, “Jump,” and it jumps, but I don’t love, I’m nothing. ^3-7If I give everything I own to the poor and even go to the stake to be burned as a martyr, but I don’t love, I’ve gotten nowhere. So, no matter what I say, what I believe, and what I do, I’m bankrupt without love.

Love never gives up.
Love cares more for others than for self.
Love doesn’t want what it doesn’t have.
Love doesn’t strut,
Doesn’t have a swelled head,
Doesn’t force itself on others,
Isn’t always “me first,”
Doesn’t fly off the handle,
Doesn’t keep score of the sins of others,
Doesn’t revel when others grovel,
Takes pleasure in the flowering of truth,
Puts up with anything,
Trusts God always,
Always looks for the best,
Never looks back,
But keeps going to the end.

Home Alone

I love being alone. I prefer to shop solo, I love losing my identity in a crowd of strangers, and I often hope that no one I know will spot me on the bus, or at the grocery store. I quite enjoy being nameless and unrecognized.

Or, at least I thought I loved it. But sitting here in a quiet apartment without my husband seems strange rather than refreshing.

My husband can tell you the moment he really fell for me – the day I was distraught and had a temper tantrum instead of being a composed, witty woman. Up until that point, I’d been deflecting him with all of my standard social defences – tour guide, confidante, intellectual, comedienne, critic, interviewer.

Let me explain. In moments of emotional tumult, past loves and losses, embarrassing and awkward social settings, I push the eject button. I spent many years with journal in hand to shield me from talking with anyone – I hid behind it at youth group, church, and school. I was that girl – the strange one sitting in the corner, brooding and writing instead of speaking.

I still love wandering through thrift shops, sitting quietly on the skytrain, and I secretly enjoy letting my answering machine do all the talking.

When I worked at a community ranch where we shared bathrooms, a kitchen and all of our working and playing hours, I kept my room as an inner sanctum. Yes, often there would be friends piled on the couch, and deep/hilarious conversation – but there were many times when I didn’t answer the knocking at the door. When I came home from a weekend in the city, I’d sneak back into my room and hope no one had seen me yet – I felt raw and unready to meet the community part of myself again.

And in the first few months of my newly-minted marriage (going on 10 months, now…), I would hide in the bathroom, or wish that I wasn’t seen at all, particularly when I wasn’t at my best. Before I met my husband, any fellow who held my affection was a specific, carefully managed part of my life. I could always say goodbye, retire to comfort of my own room, get away from scrutiny. Once, right before we were married, I actually took off on Jonathan, caught a bus and dissapeared, trying to escape myself.

I still avoid social situations often enough to worry about it – an old conversation monster grips me, and I worry about what to say next, and the consequences of not having anything to say – it’s excruciating for me when I am with a friend I know well, and I am at a loss for words, after having rivers of deep conversation. At those times, I tend to run ragged – look for the loving exit and then agonize later over the lack of words.

So you would think that having my husband away for the weekend would be long-lost balm to my solo-loving soul. When I got home, I didn’t take off my shoes, or say hello to anyone except the cat. I sat down at my computer, ate a whole chocolate bar, left my dishes all over the counter, played my country music loud, and tried to revel in the moment.

But once you’ve let yourself be seen by someone you love, it’s not easy to go back. The process can be painful – there are many, many times when I have felt embarrassed and utterly naked – wishing that nobody saw what a jerk/wreck/drama queen/goof I can be, especially the guy who I am totally in love with, and secretly still trying to impress (when I fall back into insecurity). The pain of being seen, truly and honestly seen is eclipsed by the grace and acceptance that comes in its wake.

Loving and being loved is a risk – chances are, one of us will pass away before the other, and we’ll have to deal with that loneliness. And loving and being loved involves vulnerability and being seen, which can be the most painful thing in the world.

I miss him – and this is a joyful surprise, that I will not always be the girl in the corner, writing cynically about the world and escaping when things get too personal.

Instead, I am sitting here, writing mushily about the man I love – waiting with a happy ache for him to come home.

Weeds, Part 1

“Sweet flowers are slow, and weeds make haste.”

Eight months ago, I put my name in a little wooden box, hoping for a plot in the community garden.

Last week, I got the call, and happily wrote my $15.00 cheque, dreams of ripe tomatoes, abundant lettuce and luscious table flowers blooming in my head.

This morning, I finally walked down to see my new plot, #37. I was expecting a few weeds, some upturned soil, remnant potatoes. But what I found was a wild jungle, a plot that stands out among its neighbours with their tidy rows, its weeds reaching dangerously into their manicured confines.

Plot #37, instead of being a breezy project where I could throw down some quick tomatoes and careless lettuce, is a demonstration forest of local weedery, a lush green bed of hostile takeover, a huge project. There’s even a tree. Yes, a gnarled and surly shrub (?) tree that sits in the far right corner of the triangular alotment.

No wonder the previous gardener pulled up their stakes – Plot #37 has an air of defiance about it that scares me. But its day of judgement is coming soon.

I have to confess, I haven’t done much weeding lately. My house is another jungle of dust, papers and laundry, with a fridge that is fast becoming a greenhouse. I am sitting here, writing, with a big list of chores at my elbow, avoiding them.

Bear with me now – before the tangled logic overtakes you – this post does have a point.

I need to do some serious weeding.

I’ve been struggling with dissapointment over the way life has grown up around me in the past few months, hiding from friends and fellowship because I have been choked by the unexpected. Instead of polishing off my skills in journalism amidst professors, internships and academia, I’m working as a cashier. Instead of making a name for myself and making a difference in the world, I’m making breakfast, lunch and dinner. Instead of living the single, free life and spending money on clothes and coffees, I’m shouldering the financial burden of a household while my sweet husband braves the frigid waters of the job market.

So what have I done? I haven’t been to the garden of my soul for awhile. I’ve merely been surviving.

Weeds, when you ignore them, choke out the truth about life as it stands, and prevent new growth.

But it’s not all bad news. I’m not going to stay inside while the garden grows wild. God has been walking in my garden, albeit softly, and planting some new seeds of truth.

Weed #1 – If only things were different, I’d be happy and fulfilled.

I don’t know who planted this seed, perhaps the early successes I had in high school, or the heady days of straight A’s at university, but I certainly nourished the thought. As soon as things started going ‘awry’ (no school, debt, full-time job that drains one’s creativity), I fed this particular weed with dissapointment, and it grew. I definitely didn’t sign up for this kind of life, but no one else does, either. We all live in dissapointment at times, and to be honest, living the life you dream of often ends up being empty. I remember very clearly when I was in highschool – valedictorian, straight A’s, lots of popularity, university prospects, successful basketball team, a cute date to the grad dance – I still had days where I walked home, feeling sad and lonely.

I’m happily married, living a fairytale with the man of my dreams, but we are still human beings with embarrassingly human behaviour. Fantasy can only take you so far, and most often, when the daily threatens to squash the dreamy, it’s the renewed love and affection, the shared laughter when life is a gong show, the continued relationship with my husband, not the wedding pictures, that keep me going.

Weed #2 – Good things are just around the corner/someday, I’ll arrive.

I know this one is insidious, like horsetail and dandelions. The roots go deep. I’m not talking about hope – we need hope to live – but instead, that notion that one day, we’ll turn the corner and step fully into who we really are. I’ve turned many corners in my day – and wherever you go, there you are. Being in Africa, on the other side of the globe, didn’t get me away from myself, and whatever grand event that I’m waiting for is still going to have me in it – the same me that has been learning, growing and screwing up for the past 27 years. Focusing instead on learning and serving where I am, being faithful with the present tasks I have, however menial, will bring more change than simply waiting for the corner.

Weed #3 – I don’t know who I am anymore/If only I could go back to the things I used to do

School, as my best friend says, is the only time you’ll ever be graded on what you do. This is true – and when you lose that atmosphere, the world can yawn wide with uncertainty and no clear direction – who you are, what people think of you, how well you are doing at life and work. I thought that I lost myself when I stopped school, started a job outside my field of expertise, and got married.

The other day, I was finally free! No work considerations, no dishes, just me and my car, driving across town for tea with friends and whatever else I wanted to do. So I went to all my old watering holes and the places I loved to shop. I set up meetings with the friends I used to casually hang out and have coffee with.

And with a car to myself, headed in any direction I wanted, I headed home. It was the only place I wanted to be.  And I felt more like myself than ever – not performing, not purchasing. In the midst of trying to get my ‘old’ life back after yearning for it, I ended up finding out that I didn’t really want it at all. The most enjoyable part of that day was spending time with a friend who just became a new mother and then coming home to my husband.

Weed #4 – I’m running out of time/I’ve missed my chance
The urgency that university invests in us (as well as well-meaning parents and friends and mentors) is to have goals and get on with things. I agree – it’s good to have focus. But feeling like you’ve somehow missed out on your life’s big chance at greatness because you take a year off school, or you didn’t take that job, or you couldn’t afford to…etc…is as weedy as it gets.  You don’t have to know what you’re supposed to be doing for the rest of your life, you just have to know who you’re doing it all for.

(my laundry is threatening to rise up and revolt – time to wrap up part #1 and do some practical household gardening.)

All these weeds are being plucked out of my life as I write this. Painfully, slowly, and stubbornly. But I’m convinced that these holes in the ground will be filled with something better, something more disciplined and holy than I could ever have cultivated or planned for on my own.

I’m just grateful that God’s a much more attentive gardener than I am. All I have to do is respond.