Lindsay sent me this book in the mail called "Turn my Mourning into Dancing" by Henri Nouwen.
this quote in the book really struck me:
"it takes sustained effort to reclaim my whole past as the concrete way God has led me to this moment."
it's in a chapter that is talking about how we often try to only remember the good from the past & try to forget the bad/hurtful from the past. I am guilty of doing this. I think, "If I can just forget that.... I'll feel better." but I don't. or I can't forget. or I only remember bits & pieces because I repressed it so it's harder for me to make sense of the hurt.
Nouwen talks about how it's important to gain an attitude of gratitude for what has happened and to see God's hand in bringing us to where we currently are. he says how much better it would be if we walked through suffering rather than trying to avoid it at all cost.
sometimes it takes awhile, but it seems that things always come together for me eventually. lately I've been thinking about how I can have a better attitude towards people in my life - especially people who I used to be close to in my past. when I was going through things, I did everything I could to avoid the pain, confrontation, etc. but it always comes back up. sometimes i think it's because I have too much time on my hands... but as Nouwen said, "...God has led me to this moment" so perhaps the amount of time that has been specifically alloted to me is to learn how to walk through and not around .
Friday, February 27, 2009
Monday, February 16, 2009
need, want, and the independent woman.
today I had coffee with Susan.
she's in her 40s. one of my classmates. loves basketball. lived in Indonesia for over twenty years.
we talked for over two hours! it was wonderful. she told me about life in Indonesia, and her husband and sons, and loneliness, and the need for community. I love talking to women who are older than me. it really makes me so happy.
I asked her (of course) how she and her husband got together. he's also in our class. they are extremely different. she is obviously an extrovert and he is obviously an introvert. I was curious as to how they got together.
you know how long it took for them to happen?
one. month.
she said they hung out for about three weeks when he said, "I love you." and do you know what she said? "I respect you for saying that to me. And I admire you so much. But I'm not ready to tell you that."
[[ she went up about twenty points in my book at this point. I love that she was honest & not playing games. ]]
about three days later, he bought her her favorite roses (which she had only casually mentioned but he had paid attention), and told her he wanted to marry her. even though she still hadn't said I love you back to him.
she said she needed time to think and pray about it. and told him she'd tell him by a certain time on a certain day. she made a list of pros and cons and said there were plenty on both sides.
she said such a neat thing...
"I knew I didn't need him, but I did want that depth of relationship."
and it made me feel so nice to hear her say that because I keep wrestling with my own ability to be independent & the desire to have that depth of relationship with another human. I sometimes feel guilty for loving my independence so much and even more than that.... for being good at being independent. And sometimes I hate it because I think that's what will prevent me from being in a relationship with someone one day. but. today was good affirmation for me. ONCE AGAIN. that it's God's timing. And I just need to stop fighting it.
she's in her 40s. one of my classmates. loves basketball. lived in Indonesia for over twenty years.
we talked for over two hours! it was wonderful. she told me about life in Indonesia, and her husband and sons, and loneliness, and the need for community. I love talking to women who are older than me. it really makes me so happy.
I asked her (of course) how she and her husband got together. he's also in our class. they are extremely different. she is obviously an extrovert and he is obviously an introvert. I was curious as to how they got together.
you know how long it took for them to happen?
one. month.
she said they hung out for about three weeks when he said, "I love you." and do you know what she said? "I respect you for saying that to me. And I admire you so much. But I'm not ready to tell you that."
[[ she went up about twenty points in my book at this point. I love that she was honest & not playing games. ]]
about three days later, he bought her her favorite roses (which she had only casually mentioned but he had paid attention), and told her he wanted to marry her. even though she still hadn't said I love you back to him.
she said she needed time to think and pray about it. and told him she'd tell him by a certain time on a certain day. she made a list of pros and cons and said there were plenty on both sides.
she said such a neat thing...
"I knew I didn't need him, but I did want that depth of relationship."
and it made me feel so nice to hear her say that because I keep wrestling with my own ability to be independent & the desire to have that depth of relationship with another human. I sometimes feel guilty for loving my independence so much and even more than that.... for being good at being independent. And sometimes I hate it because I think that's what will prevent me from being in a relationship with someone one day. but. today was good affirmation for me. ONCE AGAIN. that it's God's timing. And I just need to stop fighting it.
Wednesday, February 11, 2009
the passionate shepherd to his love. by c. marlowe
" COME live with me and be my Love,
And we will all the pleasures prove
That hills and valleys, dale and field,
And all the craggy mountains yield.
There will we sit upon the rocks 5
And see the shepherds feed their flocks,
By shallow rivers, to whose falls
Melodious birds sing madrigals.
There will I make thee beds of roses
And a thousand fragrant posies, 10
A cap of flowers, and a kirtle
Embroider'd all with leaves of myrtle.
A gown made of the finest wool
Which from our pretty lambs we pull,
Fair linèd slippers for the cold, 15
With buckles of the purest gold.
A belt of straw and ivy buds
With coral clasps and amber studs:
And if these pleasures may thee move,
Come live with me and be my Love. 20
Thy silver dishes for thy meat
As precious as the gods do eat,
Shall on an ivory table be
Prepared each day for thee and me.
The shepherd swains shall dance and sing 25
For thy delight each May-morning:
If these delights thy mind may move,
Then live with me and be my Love. "
sometimes, I am doing nothing, and I hear in my head the first two lines of this poem:
"COME live with me and be my Love,
And we will all the pleasures prove"
something about the flow of it CAPTURES me & then I have to look up the poem and read (usually aloud) all of it.
oh christopher marlowe. I like you.
And we will all the pleasures prove
That hills and valleys, dale and field,
And all the craggy mountains yield.
There will we sit upon the rocks 5
And see the shepherds feed their flocks,
By shallow rivers, to whose falls
Melodious birds sing madrigals.
There will I make thee beds of roses
And a thousand fragrant posies, 10
A cap of flowers, and a kirtle
Embroider'd all with leaves of myrtle.
A gown made of the finest wool
Which from our pretty lambs we pull,
Fair linèd slippers for the cold, 15
With buckles of the purest gold.
A belt of straw and ivy buds
With coral clasps and amber studs:
And if these pleasures may thee move,
Come live with me and be my Love. 20
Thy silver dishes for thy meat
As precious as the gods do eat,
Shall on an ivory table be
Prepared each day for thee and me.
The shepherd swains shall dance and sing 25
For thy delight each May-morning:
If these delights thy mind may move,
Then live with me and be my Love. "
sometimes, I am doing nothing, and I hear in my head the first two lines of this poem:
"COME live with me and be my Love,
And we will all the pleasures prove"
something about the flow of it CAPTURES me & then I have to look up the poem and read (usually aloud) all of it.
oh christopher marlowe. I like you.
Wednesday, February 4, 2009
soneto xvii de mi vida.
I had a weird flashback tonight in class. Dr. M was talking about teachers we had in the past who prepared us for exams/tests and gave us assessments directly related to what we had learned.
Even though British Literature II was not my favorite class in college due to Professor I’s crazy teaching antics, his assessments were incredibly fair.
I was thinking about how he gave us three essay topics that we were to prepare for but only one of which we would actually be writing on for our essay exam.
It led me to think about how the topic we wrote on was chosen.
professor I wanted to make sure that it was chosen as randomly as possible… assuring us that it would be so as he sipped out of his coffee cup, rumored to not be full of coffee.
Each student in class had a number next to our name in the grading book. So he picked a number. I don’t remember what number. Say, three. Then he had person #3 pick another number. Maybe they said eight. I’m not sure.
And person #8 was e. Professor I said, “Okay, e, pick a number. That’s the person that gets to pick the essay topic out of the hat.” He picked some number in the twenties. It was me. I was the number.
Everyone laughed because e and I talked constantly, walked to and from class together, probably thought we were together. What are the "odds?" ha.
One usually thinks of random number calling as being unrelated, random in every sense of the word, and yet everyone saw the silliness and irony of Professor I’s random essay choosing “system.”
A was in that class. She was one of the people who somewhat raised her eyebrows when Professor I said my name as being “the” number. She always told me that me and e were fated to be together, and gave little Finnish sayings to validate her opinion. If I had known what would ensue over the following six months, I might have thrown up on the spot. But I didn’t. I laughed with everyone else.
I don’t know why that part of things came up tonight.
As I’ve dealt with singleness and thought about past and current hurts, it’s been good to remember that whatever I wanted so badly in the past, no matter how much it hurt to let it go, I did eventually let it go.
In my current state, tonight in class, when all of this flooded into my head, I thought, “This too shall pass.”
I don’t have to grow cold in order to watch what I think I want drift away. I don’t even have to mope around. I can. And I probably will. But there was a lot of freedom in recalling my former admiration and affection for e. And the wide eyes we both had at the irony of the number he picked being mine. It makes me remember the excitement of the idea of fate and that initial and lingering attraction to another person. That feeling that it’s perfectly okay to be silly and to feel silly.
Sure, it makes me sad. I don’t even really like talking about it. And it really angered me the other night when someone brought him up. Maybe he thinks it’s odd that it still bothers me. I don’t feel hurt from it, but past wounds still ache when prodded by the wrong person.
I’ve been thinking a lot lately about the type of environment I want to create for my students to learn. I keep going back to the same word: value.
I want my students to feel valued by me. I want them to know without a doubt that I am on their side and that I know that they can succeed in learning English.
Every time I am called Teacher or Maestra, my heart gets bigger. It’s amazing. It’s an honor to be called those words. It helps me know that they value me.
And that’s where my wounds so often come from. A sense of feeling devalued by another person. It should never happen. But it does.
One of my favorite poems says,
“Te amo sin saber como, ni cuando, ni de donde.”
(I love you without knowing how, or when, or where)
And I would have to add,
“Te olvido sin saber como, ni cuando, ni de donde.”
(I forget you without knowing how, or when, or where)
Because it seems that it is in the forgetting, or rather, the decision to not dwell, the moving on, that I find the strength to find and recognize value and being valued and valuing others and all what life is. And that, is healing.
Even though British Literature II was not my favorite class in college due to Professor I’s crazy teaching antics, his assessments were incredibly fair.
I was thinking about how he gave us three essay topics that we were to prepare for but only one of which we would actually be writing on for our essay exam.
It led me to think about how the topic we wrote on was chosen.
professor I wanted to make sure that it was chosen as randomly as possible… assuring us that it would be so as he sipped out of his coffee cup, rumored to not be full of coffee.
Each student in class had a number next to our name in the grading book. So he picked a number. I don’t remember what number. Say, three. Then he had person #3 pick another number. Maybe they said eight. I’m not sure.
And person #8 was e. Professor I said, “Okay, e, pick a number. That’s the person that gets to pick the essay topic out of the hat.” He picked some number in the twenties. It was me. I was the number.
Everyone laughed because e and I talked constantly, walked to and from class together, probably thought we were together. What are the "odds?" ha.
One usually thinks of random number calling as being unrelated, random in every sense of the word, and yet everyone saw the silliness and irony of Professor I’s random essay choosing “system.”
A was in that class. She was one of the people who somewhat raised her eyebrows when Professor I said my name as being “the” number. She always told me that me and e were fated to be together, and gave little Finnish sayings to validate her opinion. If I had known what would ensue over the following six months, I might have thrown up on the spot. But I didn’t. I laughed with everyone else.
I don’t know why that part of things came up tonight.
As I’ve dealt with singleness and thought about past and current hurts, it’s been good to remember that whatever I wanted so badly in the past, no matter how much it hurt to let it go, I did eventually let it go.
In my current state, tonight in class, when all of this flooded into my head, I thought, “This too shall pass.”
I don’t have to grow cold in order to watch what I think I want drift away. I don’t even have to mope around. I can. And I probably will. But there was a lot of freedom in recalling my former admiration and affection for e. And the wide eyes we both had at the irony of the number he picked being mine. It makes me remember the excitement of the idea of fate and that initial and lingering attraction to another person. That feeling that it’s perfectly okay to be silly and to feel silly.
Sure, it makes me sad. I don’t even really like talking about it. And it really angered me the other night when someone brought him up. Maybe he thinks it’s odd that it still bothers me. I don’t feel hurt from it, but past wounds still ache when prodded by the wrong person.
I’ve been thinking a lot lately about the type of environment I want to create for my students to learn. I keep going back to the same word: value.
I want my students to feel valued by me. I want them to know without a doubt that I am on their side and that I know that they can succeed in learning English.
Every time I am called Teacher or Maestra, my heart gets bigger. It’s amazing. It’s an honor to be called those words. It helps me know that they value me.
And that’s where my wounds so often come from. A sense of feeling devalued by another person. It should never happen. But it does.
One of my favorite poems says,
“Te amo sin saber como, ni cuando, ni de donde.”
(I love you without knowing how, or when, or where)
And I would have to add,
“Te olvido sin saber como, ni cuando, ni de donde.”
(I forget you without knowing how, or when, or where)
Because it seems that it is in the forgetting, or rather, the decision to not dwell, the moving on, that I find the strength to find and recognize value and being valued and valuing others and all what life is. And that, is healing.
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