Self reflection is necessary for growth. This year has been so busy, there has been little time for reflection in my writing. I miss writing. I miss the kind of writing that makes me feel whole. I miss the kind of writing that exercises my demons and reaffirms my being.
This year I’ve fallen in love with Joan Didion. I recently started reading her memoir, “The Year of Magical Thinking” which documents her husband’s death. It’s a beautiful piece that reminds us of the humanity tied to grief. She spends the first few chapters piecing together the events of her husband’s death, trying to make sense of death. She writes about being a writer and how we process these events in our lives.
“I have been a writer my entire life. As a writer, even as a child, long before I what I wrote began to be published, I developed a sense that meaning itself was resident in the rhythms of words and sentences and paragraphs, a technique for withholding whatever it was I thought or believed behind an increasingly impenetrable polish. The way I write is who am, or have become..”
That last bit, “have become” really just made my heart jump. I believe I too, have always been a writer. I’ve always been a book lover and have always found meaning in written prose. Reading has made me a better writer. Loss and humility have made me a better writer.
I’m in my second to last semester of my education degree program. It seems obvious to me, now, that I should have pursued being an English teacher all along. I suppose at 24, public servitude didn’t seem that glorious or obvious. Nevertheless, I am here. And now I am faced with the daily task of how to create great readers and writers. And frankly, that scares the shit out of me.
I have all the textbooks and all the passion to get the job done. Failure is the darkest shadow that looms in my rearview mirror.
In May of this year, I quit working at my office job. It’s been the best decision I’ve ever made. I’ve learned there are people who can work in an office and there are people who cannot. I would rather be on adventure foraging for my own food and shelter, than be a silly hamster on a wheel. The day I quit, I quoted Melville’s Bartleby and Ice Cube with a flip of my hair:
I would prefer not to
Bye Felicia
I’m still working at the bar on nights and weekends. I have a regular that has been teaching for 30 years. When I told her I had just turned 35 and it’s really been bothering me. She replied reassuringly, “I remember that being a tough year. Just hang on, because it does turn out okay”. I’ve noticed the wrinkles around my eyes and my body changing. It’s weird noticing yourself age. Disillusionment is wasted on the youth.
I don’t mentally feel like I should be 35. I pride myself on still being with it. I pay attention to current music, blogs and Spotify. I listen to podcasts. I have Snapchat. I use Imgur and Reddit. My meme game is strong.
(I’m totally using memes with my students)
I also wonder if part of why I don’t feel like I’m that old is because I’ve delayed adulthood. I just got married and I just bought a house. I bought a car with leather interior. These are all really adult things.
I married an incredible person. He truly is my biggest fan and supporter. We are so good together, it’s kind of crazy. He’s totally the butter to my toast, the other half to my whole. I spent most of our wedding ceremony laughing. I suppose some of those eye wrinkles aren’t in vain. Happiness is measured by the depth of them.
We bought our first home two weeks before our wedding. After signing our life away, we waited in the driveway for our realtor to bring us the keys. I told him my stomach was upset and I think I needed to vomit. In his calmest voice he replied, “Well just hang on because now we have three toilets to vomit in.” I immediately went from wanting to dispel my lunch to a crying giggle fit. He always knows how to reassure me and calm my storms. I’m not sure I always do the same for him. My husband can still be a mystery to me. I’m still learning how to be his lighthouse. Perhaps it’s just more simple than I make it out to be.
I often have felt like a bad wife, friend, sibling and daughter this year. School, purchasing a new home, and a wedding have taken their financial toll and created a small window for quality time. Please know I’m thankful for each person that is in my life. My heart longs for the future that awaits- that future has time for dinner, drinks, movies, concerts, bookclubs, coffee, long talks in the kitchen, and late night phone calls. I’m always so humbled by my friendships that seem to feel like there was never a time that I went off into outer-space to get my life in order. We just fall back to earth, where we left off. Thanks for that. And to my siblings and parents, you guys are my reason for doing anything the right way. Thanks for always being my shoulders to lean on and the arms that carry me home when I am weary.
I’m almost at the end of one thing and the beginning of another. Funny that life is a series of capital letters and periods- maybe with a few dashes and semicolons in between.
I’m working on becoming okay with my wrinkles and seeing failure as a chance to learn. Being humbled by loss or disconnect is uncomfortable and awkward. But no one just wakes up and becomes Joan Didion or Jim Burke or Linda Christensen. I’m sure they were all awkward.
I use post-it notes to annotate textbooks because I feel bad about writing in them. I have a blue post-it note in Jim Burke’s English Teacher’s Companion with “Words of Encouragement” scrawled upon it. In the passage marked by the post-it, Burke writes about the first time he taught a college composition class and failed. He writes:
“…as teachers, we soon realize our first and most enduring students are and always will be ourselves. So if you want to know how to teach, begin by remembering how to learn and never stop.”
Endurance is the redeeming quality he writes about here. I’d like to think maybe stubbornness is tied to endurance. Giving up isn’t an option anymore for me. I hope 35 brings a boost in confidence and a dose of reassurance my way.
Post script, other notable things for 34: I listen to a lot of Beyonce and drink waaayy to much caffeine most days to make it through. I’m obsessed with Terror Jr. We combined bank accounts. Donald Trump became president two days before my 34th birthday. It’s the first year I’ve ever contemplated a political career or local office. I still hate oatmeal. I still want my mom when I am sick. I can’t watch Disney movies without cringing about cultural appropriation or anti-feminist themes (thank you critical theory). My nephew Sawyer was born and he looks like my brother-in-law. I wish they lived closer so I could kiss his little face. Several books about social issues, education, memoirs were added to my Amazon list. Megan Stielstra’s essays and Sara Maas’s YA fantasy novels are at the top of my “to read” over Christmas break. I also need to get better about making appointments for myself. I’m pretty sure I’m overdue for a haircut and I might have a bone spur or something wrong with my right foot. One step across the adult threshold at a time..
KEYS TO THE IGNITION 