waiting

"I hate waiting"  - Inigo Montoya

I don't know many people that like waiting. I enjoy the tension and excitement I feel right now when I think about Harry Potter 7.2 but that's because I'm confident that it will satisfy my expectations & I pretty much know what I'm in for (i.e. so much crying). However, when it comes to waiting and not knowing what you are waiting for, well, that's what Inigo is talking about. The man in black is going to take a while & he'll eventually come to the surface but then what? Is he a good sword fighter or a bad one? Will his banter be witty or sour? Will Inigo kill him too quickly or just quickly enough? - So many questions and none of them will be answered until the man in black is ready.

I'm sure you've realized by now that I am in a waiting period myself, but then, who isn't? We are all waiting for some answer but some of them are bigger or more pressing than others. My pastor taught this week on exactly this topic and I really needed to hear it so perhaps it will help you too.  He said that "God is content to not give you all the answers," in fact, God intentionally keeps them from you. Frustrating? Yes, because I hate not having answers, not having control, not knowing. It's uncomfortable & in some moments it's scary. The obvious purpose of waiting is that it grows (*should grow) us in our faith, trust and dependence upon God. Having grown up in church I've learned that any phrase that sounds as good as that means it's actually something really tough. I get excited when I think about this  waiting phase as a place of safety where I am awaiting a masterful plan that is going to push my husband and I into a new & challenging place in our spiritual lives. That sounds great & probably means we're in for something awful, something like "change". I believe I hate change far more than I hate waiting. So I am stuck, yes? Well, no, not quite. I've been realizing that in waiting there is a correct and an incorrect way to wait. I go  between them on a seemingly daily basis but I am really trying and learning to do it the right way. I'm finding comfort and peace in this silent place of God's will. He's told me to wait here and I am obeying, that's very good and I am happy in that. I'm trying not to "hate waiting" so much, but like Inigo I like to have a plan. But my plans have been falling away (remember that thesis thing?) & God's desire for me to wait is taking hold. In the end there probably isn't a six-fingered man waiting to be killed by me (as no one would take me seriously, shouting  "prepare to die!"), but there will be that joy that I will have if I continue to wait correctly and follow when He tells me to. 

(more to come on this "following" business at some unspecified time)

molly

michael

I just watched the most recent episode of The Office and I have tears pouring down my face. This may be one of the only times that that show has literally made me cry out of sheer sadness.. I dearly, dearly love the show and I am so sad to see Michael leave. Michael has made me laugh for years and harder than almost anyone else. At perhaps the highest point of my obsession with the show I would say to someone, "Hey, remember when Michael said (funny quote) " and I would laugh, really hard. Then whoever it was would say, "Wait, who's Michael? how do you know him?"  Me: "oh yeah, uh, I meant Michael Scott, uh from The Office,  not like a friend of mine or anything. . ." - this happened a lot. We were close & he has meant a lot to me. I love that in an awkward moment he can make me cringe to the point where I'm  covering my eyes because I don't want to see what I'm hearing -  that's how you know it's good.. I still can't watch the episode, "Phyllis' Wedding" - it's almost unendurable. But that's amazing, it's what amuses me and I love that push. Despite how much I have loved the show I really am surprised by how sad I am. I didn't know how much I loved & cherished having Michael Scott actively participating in my daily or weekly life. To quote him about how I feel right now, "It's simply beyond words. It's incalculacable". So, in an Ode to Michael here are some of my favorite  quotes of all time. I hope these quotes make you laugh & maybe make you watch some old episodes, please feel free to leave a favorite quote of yours below. 

Here's to you Michael,

"I swore to myself if I ever got to walk around the room as manager, people would laugh as they saw me coming, and they'd applaud as I walked away."

"That is a perfectly good mini Christmas tree. We are going to sell that to charity because that is what Christmas is all about."

"Would I rather be feared or loved? Um... Easy, both. I want people to be afraid of how much they love me."

"This is our receptionist, Pam. If you think she's cute now, you should have seen her a couple years ago."

"Armani get me Armani. (pause) You're not going to Paris."

"I'm very fast. I'm like Forrest Gump"

"This is an environment of welcoming, and you should just get the hell outta here,"

"Yeah, I went hunting once. Shot a deer in the leg. Had to kill it with a shovel. Took about an hour. Why do you ask?"

"Yes. It is true. I, Michael Scott, am signing up with an online dating service. Thousands of people have done it, and I am going to do it. I need a username, and... I have a great one. "Little Kid Lover". That way people will know exactly where my priorities are at."

"Toby is in HR, which technically means he works for corporate, so he's really not a part of our family. Also, he's divorced, so he's really not a part of his family." 

Prank call: "Hey, Ryan, this is your girlfriend and I'm mad. (out of control laughter)" 

"You may look around, and see two groups here. White collar, blue collar. But I don't see it that way. You know why not? Because I am collar-blind." 

To Toby: "Why are you the way that you are? Honestly, every time I try to do something fun or exciting, you make it not... that way. I hate... so much about the things that you choose to be."

and finally . . .

"That's what *she* said." 

Thanks for the laughs buddy,

molly

925

{ s u n d a y . . . }

I had the sunday of sundays this week and I am so excited to share with you. I hadn't quite intended to go to church, I didn't set an alarm and decided that if I woke up too late I would do pilates and clean the house. Bryce was working and I usually don't have the drive to get up and go without him. However, I woke up in time,  called my mom and we were early enough that we had time to grab some coffee and sit outside of church before it started. So nice. 

Four boys were baptized that morning, I saw and talked to a lot of old faces and met a few new ones. My parents and grandmother were there with me for the beginning part of the service, we worshiped together and celebrated the boys. After the baptisms my family left having attended the earlier service and having other places to be. I sat alone in that beautiful church and I was so comfortable and happy that it surprised me.

{ b a c k g r o u n d }

it is necessary for me to tell you this so that you will grasp the meaning of this sunday.

For approximately five years I have been seeing the numbers 925 everywhere I look. Five years ago they were part of a phone number that I called all the time, and that I ceased to call after a painful break-up. I began seeing 925 EVERYWHERE. Each time I would look at the clock morning or night, it was 9:25. It made me crazy. I hated the reminder, the taunt, the pain that I associated with those numbers and I couldn't escape them. Over time their appearance subsided with the occasional flare-up. It felt like a sickness but I hadn't had it for some time. However, last month I began seeing them again; on the clock in my car, on my phone, even on my computer which is unfixably, off by 8 hours. I  turned on an X-Files episode and the first thing I saw was "925" on the side of a huge ship. I was stunned, it was too much and I felt angry. Why was I seeing 925 again?

I shared this issue with a counselor and he immediately, before I could finish going through my list of places, said, "Do you think it could be a scripture reference?"

I looked at him and said that I couldn't think of one but that I would run home and race through my Bible. He suggested I not do that. "Wait for God to reveal it to you," he said, "don't force meaning where it doesn't belong". 

So I waited, & then Sunday happened.

{ . . . s u n d a y }

My pastor began reading out of John 10:10 "I came so that you might have life and have it in abundance". Beautiful. I begin reading that passage where Jesus is calling himself my shepherd and me a sheep. I'm not too flattered but i know it's true. As I'm reading I realize that chapter 9 is just the column to the left of where I'm reading. I think, "why not? I'll look, it'll probably be something about directions or names or just something too random. but I want to know". I read the passage leading up to my numbers. It's the story of the blind man that Jesus has healed. The Pharisees are questioning the man and telling him it wasn't Jesus who healed him because Jesus was a sinner. Then, in John 9:25 the man says, 

"Whether he is a sinner or not I do not know.  
One thing I do know, I was blind but now I see"

Amazing Grace. That was my first thought, it's one of my favorite hymns and was the dearest of ideas to me five years ago when I had lost so much and felt that I had so little. I had Jesus' amazing grace, I had been blind and I was just beginning to see. 

Alone in the back I sat shaking as I read the passage over and over and over again. I had not forced this meaning, this is what 925 had meant all along. This was my verse, my 925, my reason, my grace. I sat there and was struck and overwhelmed by the deeply personal way God was communicating to me. That he was changing those numbers that I had so hated into numbers of tearful joy, into a gift that I will cherish for the rest of my life. 

That morning was a testimony of so many things. God's redemption, goodness, intimate love, personal grace and divine timing. I am overwhelmed still and have to tell myself even as I see 925 now that it isn't bad anymore, I can now see.

my heart is so deeply grateful for sunday and I just had to share it with you.

molly

joyce

this has been a victorious week for me my friends. In the light of one decision that has set me free so many other little moments of sweet revelation have followed. I received so much affirmation from you and others in my life and it has been utterly thrilling. God did not have to add other hearts to mine, as I was confident and happy in my decision to delete the thesis, but He did anyway. As always with God, He overwhelms my soul.

I've been buried in James Joyce this week and if you are aware of my academic history you know how happy that has made me. I first encountered the illustrious Mr. Joyce in HS where I attempted to read Portrait of an Artist as a Young Man - it is one of two books I didn't finish in HS (I've added many more to that since but I'm trying to stress how great my hatred was). I hated him.

In 2007 I decided to take a study abroad course in Dublin, Ireland. The course was a seminar in James Joyce. I didn't care anymore, I wanted to go to Ireland and that was my ticket. While there is a very special Dublin story that I could share here I will wait and save it for it's anniversary date in June - this post is for Joyce. 

In Dublin my classmates and I read Joyce's collection of short stories called Dubliners in the first week and in the subsequent two weeks we tackled Joyce's epic and monstrous Ulysses. The 700+ page book takes place in one day and each event happens on a specific and actual street or place in Dublin. I ate the same sandwich Leopold Bloom ate at the Davy Burns pub and walked the shores of Sandy Mount where Stephen Dedalus pondered "ineluctable modality." I have read a lot of books, mostly classic titles and I am proud of my reading list, my crowning achievement thus far is having read Ulysses. This book is not for the faint of heart, the casual or naive reader. You should probably be 24 before you read this book and even then, this is not an add to go read it. However, if you are an English major (and I suspect that many of you dear readers are) then this book is a must for you, it just might change your life. I didn't realize the impression the book, the place and the experience had made upon me until months or maybe a year after I got home. I had carried that book with me everywhere for three solid weeks and even after that I continued to carry it, we were dear friends, my companion in my first great journey. 

I got to re-read another story of Joyce's this semester, a short and lovely little story called "Araby," the name captivates me, I'd name my daughter that if I could, but I will probably have to give it to a second or third basset hound as the first one will obviously be "Ulysses." Anyway, this story I can recommend to you, snatch it somewhere, take 25 minutes to dig in and read it, fall into it, fall in love with it and then sit up and clap yourself on the back, you have read and survived James Joyce. 

Besides just wanting to talk about Joyce, I decided it was probably time to explain that "shellcocoacoloured" is a Joycean creation from one of the first chapters in the book. The phrase, like "Araby" caught me. It is simple, beautiful, with familiar words re-fashioned into a phrase that holds it's own meaning for each reader. I selected it because I find myself and most people feel that way about themselves. We are each made up of pieces of so many different words that we can hardly ever use just one. Joyce doesn't want to, doesn't have to because he's Joyce, so he writes "shellcocoacoloured" and prints a moment of the sublime onto a page.

I suppose in my own way that is what I have set out to do. I don't quite know what I am yet or what this will become, but being "shellcocoacoloured" is a sweet, and enchanting place to start.

molly

a thinky thing

I have been in the depths of my mind this last month, evaluating life decisions, relationships, goals and new ideas. It's been an interesting time and a difficult one as well. Change is a'comin' and that scares just about all of us I think. 

I have made a big decision and I mean really crazy, big, drastic decision: I am no longer going to write a thesis on Hamlet. If you had suggested to me just a couple months ago an alternative option to finishing my masters degree I would have stubbornly and with determination said that I wanted to write it, to have a book, a big bunch of pages that I had written - looking back, I think it was an ego trip. I don't care anymore about the thesis, I do still care about the topic. My passion for Shakespeare hasn't died, but my drive to teach or participate in the academic community has and I am still in a little shock over it. 

My priorities have changed drastically over this last year, slowly but drastically. Bryce and I were sitting in the "New Members" class at our church, a church I have attended for every year of my life and that I am now excited to intentionally commit to. But sitting in that class our pastor started sharing different people groups that are untouched in our surrounding community. I sat there and my heart hurt for them, I wanted to talk to them, explain grace & Jesus and in that moment the grand idea of my thesis fizzled. I realized my time will be better spent without it - as I imagined and realized that reality, my stress level vanished, I was smiling, I felt value and purpose in my decision, a rightness with God. Amazing yeah? I wasn't in a church service, I wasn't even thinking about school, but God came and graced me with peace, joy, and a satisfaction in my decision to do the exam that I never could have imagined. 

I'd love to tell you more but I have to be off to work. Maybe I'll drop in later tonight, my heart is full and the blog is a little empty. I've been caught in this "thinky thing" - a fantastic little phrase my dear friend shared with me (a quote from a professor - yes, see I could teach!) - and I am coming out of it now. I am processing and getting so excited. 

Life is filling up with meaning again.

molly

faraway spring

Another little painting for you to enjoy. I love changing my desktop to different Ellenshaw paintings throughout the year and according to season. There is just something so nice about opening my computer and seeing a simple, sweet and wonder-filled scene of all my old friends. 

This one in particular has a rather peculiar effect on my heart. The picture reminds me of a spring I've lived, faraway and long ago, secret in my memory. The way the golden light shines in and how  little everyone seems beneath the canopy of fresh and quiet trees make is magical.  I had many spring moments like this as a child, running out doors with my friends, playing in the twilit park with my dad, and sailing on the cool dark ocean with my family. These fragmented memories of light and happiness  are what I feel  the glow and wonder in this painting attests to. As I look at it I feel sheltered, there's a quiet over my mind as I observe the innocent play, and my heart rests as I imagine the infinite woods rustling with life. Isn't it nice that through art those moments of a faraway spring can come rushing back? I hope you feel some of that as you look on this, allow your heart and mind to sink into that dear child within you and rejoice over a few memories. Please feel free to share below, I'd love to listen.

molly

Atlas Shrugged

Alright my dears, I have decided that I can trust you and because of that I have decided that it's time for me to confess my complete and slightly unwholesome obsession with a book called Atlas Shrugged. Ayn Rand published the book in 1957, it weighs in around 1060 pages and it continues to be a top-seller in book stores to this day. I started the monster in 2008, it took me roughly four months to read it, it's a very long book and not for the uncommitted reader. To say I became obsessed is accurate except that it doesn't fully express how every single thought, comment and idea that popped into my head over ensuing year revolved around the book. I breathed it, and got so passionate about it I would sweat. I knew it was bad when Bryce said he couldn't take anymore. I broke the patience of the most patient man I know, he lets me tap his face endlessly to my own amusement but he couldn't take any more of Atlas. Needless to say n reading it I learned many things about myself, how neurotic I could be, but more importantly, I saw my moral and economic outlook change as I recognized Rand's belief that they are steadfastly linked to each other. Rand's philosophy deems people that work hard, earn their own living, who don't rely on the charity or sympathy of others as morally and economically upright individuals. She condemns free-loaders, looters, and anyone willing to complain before they are willing to work. She treats these kinds of people as evil, immoral, shameful and untrustworthy. - It sounds just and I love it, parts of it. She motivates me to work because I am conscious of the fact that as I work I am fairly, morally and truly earning the lifestyle that I have. It is a great feeling, I am indebted to no one, I've made it on my own, I worked hard and I deserve what I have. However, in the novel, Rand takes this philosophy of "objectivism" and applies it to  every aspect of human life: sex, love, work, clothing, relationships, etc . . .

In short, Life of Capitalism = Good, Life of Communism/Socialism = Really Bad/ you suck.

Problematically for me, I couldn't get my Christian philosophy reconciled to Rand's objective outlook. The problem for me, was grace. Grace is never earned or deserved, I am and will always be indebted to the sacrifice of Jesus and I can do nothing to decrease the cost. This was very, very frustrating to the fresh Atlas fanatic that I was. In seeking to reconcile these philosophies I knew I could not accept anything that conflicted with Biblical truth so I turned down the idea of having to earn the love of my husband and chose to just accept it. For example, despite the fact that I failed to do the dishes last night, he still told me he loved me today (yes!). I have limited Rand's philosophy to my work attitude, it boosts me to go and put in the hours, do my job well and in a way that I will be proud of. It is so satisfying to work and leave thrilled with what I got accomplished (even if it was explaining to a dear old man that wifi means "wireless" and no, we don't have a cord to connect your wifi nook to the wireless internet).

I have had to acknowledge that I am not a rational, heroic character out of Rand's book. I am a flawed person, in need of grace, in need of so much more than I can get for myself. Lately, God has been sprinkling money about the earth for Bryce and I. Last week I found a little pile of $3 at school, Bryce found a $50 on a car a few months back and I am always finding pennies or dimes on the ground wherever I go. Our parents have been generous to us in chipping in on groceries and blessing us with sweet gifts. All of that is all money we haven't earned, but God's love and grace has brought it to us. Therefore I will be thankful. I will also go to work tomorrow with the goal of earning enough money to purchase this bracelet conceptualized in Atlas Shrugged. 

 It's made of Reardon Steel! I WANT IT NOW. 

Go read the book and you'll understand how I could so passionately want to earn something as ugly as this.

molly