i know this.

lulls are expected, in life and in blogging. some months i am compelled to write and others i am not. well, perhaps i am but i am too lazy or tired or busy or happy to actually sit down and get on with it.

this was my last* summer at the private school i have been working at for three years. with my raise came more responsibilities. i was ready for them. i was trusted to plan and lead the daily activities eight hours a day, five days a week. there were small catastrophes every day, which i learned to expect and laugh at. there were days when children transitioning into kindergarten scurried out of the restroom naked, third graders had bleeding knees, children had lost socks and a kitchen worker with no consideration for the chaos i was swamped in badgered on and on about a bucket full of ice and if i was done with it. did she see the naked child or bleeding knees? there were days when we watched movies and shared food in a communal way that reminded me of family and played egyptian war for hours on end. there were days when children told me they loved me. there were also days when i ran after children with disabilities, feeling helpless and praying they would not run any further. life with children, especially outside of the classroom where they confide in you, is certainly not boring. it is the most difficult, rewarding thing i have experienced and i am sad to say goodbye to them.

two weeks before the summer program ended, i realized my income would be significantly lower. i applied for jobs in a fury - seventeen, i think? this would explain my current situation:
teaching music on mondays at a private school
tutoring on tuesdays and wednesdays (and hopefully subbing these days, too)
preschool teacher on thursday mornings
nanny on thursday and friday afternoons
part-time position at my church, which requires my time throughout the week

it's okay for you to think i'm crazy. i am. i know this. i also know that i can do this. whenever i find myself knee deep in a busy season i always look back to spring semester of  2012 when i was taking 21 units, in the middle of an internship, and working. if i could survive that, i could survive anything. oh, and there is also something else i am doing right now:

planning a wedding. because i'm engaged!
that deserves its own post. soon enough, soon enough.

well, blog world. i'm back for a few months before i disappear again.
cheers!

*funny how we plan these things. i wonder, will it really be my last summer there? i miss those kids mucho.

aging.

i am aging. does that sound silly at age twenty-three? well, i am.

i look at my mother, age sixty-four, and see a radiant, irrepressible woman.

a month ago i noticed that the veins on my legs were getting bluer, greener, darker. some even slightly raised. i am aging, i thought, and of all the magnificent applications of my imagination i could choose from - i chose worry.* and where else would worry lead me but the infinitely credible world wide web. it is the authority of our time. i half-laughed at this instinctual compulsion to ask ask ask the omniscient google why and how and all sorts of other inquiries. i laughed because it is the first place i go when i am worried about something. i am a hypochondriac in the worst sense, don't you know? and later, in the bath and on the feller's shoulder and on my dear friend's bed, i sobbed because i am so terribly afraid of being rejected for my body - my small breasts and wide hips and tiny belly and veiny limbs. i thought i would handle aging better. i thought it was the one thing i was mentally prepared for - it will come, i thought; it is unavoidable, i reminded myself; i am more than body; i chanted. but who is prepared to age? to feel and see the good things - health and youth - pass? to know this passing gives way to the one dependable eventuality - death?

but i look at my mother, age sixty-four, and cannot help but swell with affection. she has wrinkles and grey hair and lovehandles and painful vericose veins and arthritis. she has consistently been slighted by the men in her life. she could be like so many - stalking empty beauty. but she has chosen to give herself to the needs of others - her grandchildren, her children, her siblings, her own mother. she is a well of good intentions. she is a loving cook and dedicated worker. she is endlessly interested in the lives of those she loves. and her advice is always the truest thing she knows to be helpful. she is a beautiful woman. and is most happy when plating dinner, jabbing at her eldest, laughing loud and full.

these past few weeks i can see how boring and pitiful it is to be obsessed with maintaining youth. what a dull life. my mother teaches me this. working with children gives me a means to practice this 8 hours a day, 5 days a week. i can restrain myself from interacting with the kids (i.e. not going in the water with my bathing suit on, etc.) or give myself fully to them. to be tugged on. to be a child's pillow. to become a master sand castle maker. to be hugged, squeezed and, occasionally, dragged. to tag them back-and-forth-back-and-forth because there is no such thing as "no tag backs." to be out of breath and tired by them. to save them from that-really-big-wave. to tell them no. to throw the ball hard because they can handle it. to run across the campus in search of a stuffed animal or missing sock. preoccupied with my insecurities, i could be no real help. i could offer them nothing.

so, i am aging and all good things wither and die. but my mother reminds me that fear and worry don't change this, that life is better when it is about others, that serving heals us.

*the feller occasionally calls me a "worried wart," rather than a "worry wart." it is because 6-8 months ago two warts appeared on my cursed left foot. they are since gone and the memory of them makes me laugh if only because it makes him cringe.

place a fan

sweltering. i feel like i only hear this word on the news when they enlighten concerned viewers about the oncoming weather. days are referred to as scorchers. "well, folks tomorrow will be a scorcher!" to describe the current weather as such would be accurate but too close to cliche for my comfort. too close to the overused language of weathermen and women who aim at our laughter only to suffer the changing of the channel. regardless their language, they are right.

it's hot, friends. minus the cool breeze we all expected. it's the breath of a dragon after a fiery expulsion. it's the circus-mirror heat waves when you eye the concrete. it's white wine without the sweetness. and it being week ten of summer day camp - i am suffering. and so are the children. most of my days are outdoors. messy monday activities? outdoors. activity time? outdoors. water play? outdoors. team challenges? outdoors. i love summer. i mean, i love summer. bare shoulders and legs (aside from shaving. but, seriously, who does that anymore?). dresses and skirts and shorts and tanktops. and the beach. i am a summer girl who is doubting her love affair with the heat. i leave work exhausted and i come home and immediately place a fan in front of my face. for a girl who shivers at the slightest breeze, this is pretty ridiculous. the upside is that this is the last week of summer day camp. week ten might kill me but only after i've been beat to the ground by the heat.

and smile.

"miss r, you look like an adult."

this was the confidence of a fourth grader at the end of her 2011 school year - 

despite my tussled hair tightly secured in a messy bun and my bare face. despite golden feathers the length of my pinky nail hanging from my ears and the feller's least favorite shirt, incidently one of my favorites at the time, her eyes widened with admiration and discovery - i was an adult. something magical and to be desired. 

i felt the change but could not name it then. she was perceptive enough to take note and say something. and i knew, then, sitting on mustard lunchtables that i would remember her words and her face. thank you, mckenzie for noticing. and for saying so.

nothing is more adult-ish than knowing oneself. my twenty-first year was one of the most difficult for this reason.  to know oneself is to see oneself clearly. among other things, i was selfish, deceptive, a contradiction, and deeply, horribly insecure. the process of knowing myself, which is on going and never quite sufficiently completed, revealed good things too. tenderness. creativity. the ability to care. i digress. as i was saying, knowing onself is a sure marker of adulthood. scrutinizing oneself is invaluable. scrutinizing with gentleness and graciousness. never the mean kind that cynics and unhappy people do.  that day at the lunchtables i knew who i was. the terrible and the terribly good. i looked at the trajectory i would soon be headed and was at peace.  i could sit across from myself and smile. knowing my worth and knowing my strength and knowing my beauty. knowing i would not go at it alone.  of course, i doubted all these things. and sometimes i still do. hello, human condition! you are a predictable one. but in those moments i sink myself in the truth. i do combat with truth. i come up breathing with truth. and in the process i am becoming a young lady. an adult of sorts. how adventuresome and peculiar and mysterious and wonderful to be taking shape, to become.

p.s. tomorrow is twenty-two months with the feller. eeks!
p.s.s. i bought a bathing suit today and had a wonderful experience. this week i will write about it i promise.
p.s.s.s. book club is this week. brave new world. hoorah!

invite them both.

dear little ones,

i do hope you aren't holding a grudge because of the silence between this letter and the last. look over it, please. i said some things about being brave and change and about my job with children - daycare kids. i am going on my third year at this school. i don't get paid as much as others but i enjoy it so. i am in the thick of my second summer day camp (theatre camp included) and will be running the whole daycare sha-bang with alexis next year.

i wonder if you know her. if she knows you. i hope.

one day there will be a time when you experience a spell of stillness.  as if the future is painfully bashful or playfully hiding or proudly ignoring you. and like most things, you will be both thankful and worried at once. thankful because you need a break. worried because you wonder what comes next. invite them both. let gratitude loose you to learn new things and forge good friendships and know who you are and what you like and what you, quite frankly, don't like. but never let thankfulness slip into entitlement or complete frivolity (i say complete, because sometimes to do lists must be left unchecked for the sake of your own humanity). and let worries motivate you to be responsible and practical and frugal and wise. but never let them immobilize you 'neath the weight of impossibilities. the bills will be paid. things will get done.

*

truth be told, i am tucked so tight in this lull i wonder if it might ever pass. if you get these letters, it is proof that it does (if only to interrupt my life again in a few years). in grade school you press towards middle school. in middle school you aspire to high school. in high school you plan for college. and sometimes the schooling continues. and sometimes definite long term plans unfold. but i have no masters program in mind. and there is no full-time career beckoning me any time soon. and so i am, in some eyes, plodding forward for no good reason. i am aimless, in the worst sense. the lull is a euphemism for doing nothing. this, of course means being no one. but can i let you in on a secret? i run at a canyon three-four times a week. and this saturday i am officially learning to ride a bike. and i might just take up swimming too. i am in a book club with friends and loved ones. people i share meals with and couches with. people i watch redboxes with (do we do that?). and i am committing eighty percent of each paycheck to loans. i am paying for my own voice instruction. oh! and since i've graduated, i have become quite the cook! i plan services and lead intermitently on sunday mornings at a church i can walk to. and i am learning about life from these people. about being generous with your home and time and money. and i still play mancala with children. uno. shark attack (duh). hide and go seek tag. sticks and rocks tic-tac-toe.  jenga. i still cook with them and make books with them and organize relay races. i still diffuse conflict and teach them about forgiveness and kindness and about being a good sport. and for the first time, i get to teach them specific bible lessons. i get to pray with them. i get to walk them through lifting their hands and kneeling and dancing and worship. i get to see them close their eyes. and know whatever is happening in that room between them and God is real.

there are times when i am convinced that i am doing nothing. because, shocker, there is no goal to be fulfilled in the near future. but, little ones, i am building a life. with thanksgiving and worry. with bravery. and with joy.

sincerely,
a twenty-two year old who enjoys reading and writing and singing and the local church and children but has no idea where she will end up.

*i think the spell looks like this. do i play? do i sit? do i walk? and if i do, to where?

dust.

with the start of summer day camp this week i am reminded of my finite form:

dust.

don't get me wrong, i love my kiddos. i equate their scribbles to van gogh. they are silly. they are curious. they fumble through hellos with ease and forget offense in favor of a team game. and their discoveries illumine every contently slouched and apathetic part of my heart.

i am working roughly thirty hours a week at summer day camp. with children who desire friendship and leadership. my responsibilities range from leading worship through music, coming up with skits, bible lessons, etc. to leading team challenges to being attentive to what the little ones are up to (they are always up to something) and, at the same time, being attentive to the older ones who want a game coordinator, referee, and participant.

this doesn't include my job at my church or family time or date time with the feller or friend time with lovely individuals or running or cooking or cleaning or voice lessons.

and today i can feel myself pulling inward, starved for hardy portions of quiet.
it is the reading, writing, crafting, lounging, eating in quiet (read: alone) that i covet.

it is the quiet that i want.
and as an introvert it is more need than want.

i am dust.
i flourish like the grass and flowers...
and am gone when the wind blows.
my frame is weak.

and so i carve out time.
no, i guard my time.
and i lean on the One who is strong.
and i find that in my leaning, my admittance of weakness
i am strong too.

the same effect.

school is not yet in full swing. i have not felt the shove of deadlines, though they all are written in my planner. yes, a semester's worth of due dates in a red-orange hue, in a heavy inked pen are all there waiting - and i'd like to think yearning with fierce desire - to be crossed off.

*

so here i am in the library: sifting though blogs, capturing the words of others and holding them tight, curious if the words i offer up to a vast, truly incomprehensible world (even online. especially online.) have the same effect. and suddenly i am swept with the urge to write. even my text to the feller about a subject which could only elicit drop of the jaw was more finely tuned.**

yesterday was good. today hasn't been so bad either. but yesterday is the subject at hand. tuesdays and thursdays are early days. yesterday i managed to have cereal. frosted mini wheats before work at 6:45 am is ideal. (anything before 6:45 am is ideal.) i am a cereal girl through and through. i adore the children i work with. that's all i will say for now. i also adore driving to work (only five-ten minutes away) and seeing the sky, lush as velvet, dyed with color. its complexion varies but never lacks in vibrancy or the zing and zip of life. hurriedly i got home from work. showered. dressed. filled my water bottle. and on my way to do homework with the feller, i sang loudly the hymn listed in my devotional. it is one of my favorites. it was wonderful to see him. (i always feel strange when talking about happy circumstances. i know better the sadder ones, the ones inundated with darkness. i have explored the painful subtleties of sadness: twinges of resentment, pangs of fear, stitches of confusion. sadness is a labyrinth i have spent much time in. happiness is less of a labyrinth and more of, for lack of a better metaphor, an open field. as much as i pride myself on my love of freedom, it scares me so. i would much prefer the mossy grey walls of a labyrinth that i know. at least, that is my natural inclination. but as i said before, things are changing.) i digress. the feller and i spent time in a study room on the second floor of the library. it just felt so incredibly good to be with him. shared joy. shared laughter. shared avoidance of responsibilities (like those times last semester when holding each other close was more prized than scribbling lecture notes in a room that is too cold). i love sharing life with him. classes for two hours or so. and then more time with the feller. he is remarkably attractive. especially in a henley. or that sweater he wore wednesday. especially when he is so close. after canoodling (mean girls reference, anyone?) too long we made sandwiches. deli-style. rolls. avocado. sprouts. provolone. ham. turkey. tomatoes. and had fresh tangelos. so juicy! then off to work again. then off to the internship. then home to father's steak and beans and mother's vegetables and mashed potatoes. i went to bed fairly early and accidentally left a candle on all night. thankfully, the house didn't catch fire.
yesterday was good.

*a picture should go here. i can't find one. lo siento.
**see here i used a musical expression about language. i am more aware of this - this pairing of concepts and words and subjects - because of the recent discussion of a condition named synesthesia in my cognitive psychology class. watch this. it is, i promise you, fascinating.

daycare kids.

dear children-who-i-will-send-off-to-school-one-day,

psst.

i have my first real job since fall of senior year in high school. and i work with children. daycare kids. you might be one. i was one. waiting for grandma to show up as i make bracelets and play mancala. ahem. beat everyone at mancala.

i've actually had this job for nine months now and i love these children. even when they have attitude and would rather watch Matilda for the hundreth time than make crafts or build towers out of legos. we play freeze tag, four corners. Jenga is a hit. so is soccer, now that it is warmer out. so is painting, but the paint is strong and opening the doors for ventilation is a must. snack time consists of dry cereal, chips, pretzels, or popcorn. we've had smores once or twice. and we did have Little Debbie Oatmeal Creme Pies. your grandfather bought sweets all the time. i ate these growing up. you might have never eaten them. i don't want you to eat ice cream three times out of the week. or have Little Debbie snacks at lunchtime. i want to make you food. or try at least. pack you good things. and always give you extras for after school. well, if you stay after school.

i haven't written to you for a while. life has been like a teetertotter.

one day we will talk about change.

and how this particular time in my life required courage.

i have to be brave.

for myself. for others. and as time will tell, for you.

i have to choose life. a different sort of life than i ever imagined.

and it is scary.

but when you are scared. we can be brave together, yes?

sincerely,

a twenty-one year old almost grown-up