In search of some water that isn't so smeary

One of the worst things about living with 7 women in a cramped house is never having space to reflect. Even when I have room in my schedule for being time, which is not very often, I must war against the forces of chaos in my own home. There is no place in my home where I can hide from the world. Living in the midst of so many people is a little like living in a bus terminal. It isn't a place to dwell, but rather an in-between-place. It's a shooting-off point for going or coming, never for being. I love all the women I live with, but, there are really, very, many of them. This means that contemplative time becomes media time. Instead of reading or writing or merely sitting in silence, I watch Gilmore Girls or crack jokes about our Landlord and The Poolboy . I enjoy these things, but when they are over, and I take myself to bed, I find that I am missing something. I'm missing peace. In order to find peace and rhythm and balance in the midst of a hectic life, I need time to be. I used to run away to coffee shops for this, because it is possible to shut out the world if you don't know the world by name and it isn't asking you to have in-depth conversations about racism or tell you a funny anecdote from its day.
I want peace. I can do the busy, crazy, hectic, frantic chaos that is daily life only if I stop in-between-times to be and to create cosmos for myself. So I'm taking this moment, the few brief minutes between class and work, to stop and reflect on my internal state. I feel crowded. Not merely hedged in on every side by living partners, but also crowded with things, with noise, with bustle. I think I'd like to spend some time on top of a mountain, just for the sake of sitting in open air and silence--not surrounded by possessions, not distracted by disorder, just given the chance to be.
It's Lent, and I'm hardly aware of it because the chaos that is around me is entering my soul. I can't hear the voice of God over the screechings of audible and visible clutter. I often wonder what it would be like to live with all of my possessions on my back. Like a fairy tale character, my kerchief tied to a stick, holding within it every thing on this earth I call mine. It sounds so sweet and free sometimes, to live this way. I would often like to have no blanket but the stars, no pillow but the earth, no lullaby but the dance of the planets. I've been thinking so much about eternity and the weight of the world. I don't believe the body is bad, as Plato does, but the body is so prone to gathering things about itself, things that weigh it down and prevent it from glimpsing what is meant foremost to be seen.
Lent, when I remember it's Lent because someone offers me a cookie--reminds me of the cumbersome nature of possessions. Giving up "pleasure foods" in some ways isn't even hard, because I'm still surrounded by so much real, natural, healthy food. Abundance is with us still. I think it's the abundance that bothers me, that hinders my being, because it's of the wrong sort. It isn't the abundance of charity, of peace, or of beauty; it's the abundance of worthless items crowding the vision of my heart, body, and brain.

Turn my eyes from looking at worthless things; and give me life in your ways.

"You're glumping the pond where the Humming-Fish hummed!
No more can they hum, for their gills are all gummed.
So I'm sending them off. Oh, their future is dreary.
They'll walk on their fins and get woefully weary
in search of some water that isn't so smeary."

Streams of Lenten Conciousness. . .

I'm keeping Lent this year. Really keeping it. Not in the usual sense where I think vaguely pious thoughts to myself about the suffering and crucifixion of Jesus.

For I know my transgressions,
and my sin is ever before me.

Two years ago, when I was in England, I went to a truly beautiful Ash Wednesday service in the chapel at Magdalen College. I'll confess that it was beautiful to the point of being distracting and disorienting, but the memory of that night serves me well. I must say that it was an achingly beautiful service. Candlelight, incense, a boys choir, stained glass and statues of saints, British people, liturgy, participation, religious vestments--all things I love. I heard sung for the first time the Allegri Miserere, which has become one of my favorite musical pieces. It's Psalm 51, sung in Latin, which is currently my favorite psalm for Lectio. I love this Psalm and the Miserere because they make me feel like it's OK to stop and simply recognize my sinfulness. I spend most days concealing sins or trying to immediately fix them. I love the darkness because my deeds are evil. These songs help me see the value of sitting with my transgressions in full awareness of my own wretchedness. It's freeing I think, and the first step to genuine repentance. I remember how later that night I returned to study at the Bodleian, the wispy grey cross on my studious brow as I researched rewarded virtue in the fairy tales of George MacDonald. What a beautiful life.

This Lent, I've decided to give up all food that I eat only for the sake of pleasure. So dessert, eating out, and sugar are off the list. Not just for the sake of foregoing pleasures, but for the pursuit of greater ones. Giving up "pleasure foods" for Lent mentally reinforces that Jesus is the source of happiness. It's an idea worth thinking about. If I reward myself in the midst of reading Hume or memorizing French vocabulary with a pan au chocolat, or grab Thai food with a roommate after church, I am easily satisfied. This isn't bad. But it's another matter after a long day of researching a paper on cross-cultural literacy development or preparing grad school applications to simply sit back and not attempt to satisfy my desire for reward. It's good sometimes to simply feel the lack of something.

Self-denial really is it's own pleasure. It slows one down and allows for the space to reflect. If, as Pascal says, all men are distracting themselves because what we most fear is being alone with ourselves in a quiet room, then it's good for me to brave the simplicity of emptiness. It's good to shake off the noisy demands of the body in order to hear the quiet, pensive pleas of the soul.

Generally, I love having the space and time to reflect. But it's easy to forget to do this in the midst of finishing up my last semester of college, straining with all my might to run with elegance the last leg of a difficult race.

I want Lent this year to be about feeling the lack. I think I've forgotten the good in feeling that I'm missing something. It's amazing how possible it is to live with unsatisfied desires. This has become especially important because my biggest fears right now are concerned with being able to make ends meet after college. I'm fearing only the things Jesus commands me not to fear. To feel, even in a small way, that I can be OK without is a great boon to my soul.

I'm also trying to be unselfish. I'm so morbidly selfish it's a wonder anyone wants to be friends with me. The practice of going without for Lent is meaningful then, because it reminds me that my primary goal shouldn't be my own comfort. I always provide rationale for self-centeredness, claiming that I must ensure my own needs are met because no one else will do so. But again, if God is our Father and if he bid even Jesus to wander in the desert with him for 40 days, then I can trust him to care for me while I seek to love others first.

All this because I'm not eating pancakes for breakfast? Yes. I think so.

I want truth for food.

Today

Today I'm sitting in an armchair listening to the wind blow through the weeds in the driveway. It's nice, sitting here, momentarily believing that nothing I do matters. Right now I don't want anything but to be here, in this room, in this house, wearing these clothes, and enjoying this weather. I am content just now; but in about five minutes I will be grumpy again.

Sometimes I wish I could be free of all desire. Sometimes I think living would be better if I didn't have any vested interest in my own existence. I've been thinking about the verse that says "and this is eternal life, that they may know you the only true God and Jesus Christ who you have sent". It's hard to think about life in terms of relationship with a person, especially with the Poet of the Cosmos. I want to pursue real life and seek after real love, and live with a full awareness of the glorious inheritance that is mine in Jesus. I want to enjoy what is temporal and tangible, but I want to love and recognize with my whole self what is eternal and invisible.

I learned to pray in French class two days ago. I'm realizing that what's important for me in language learning is developing early on a spiritual/emotive/religious vocabulary. It's all well and good to memorize the words to "La Vie en Rose", but it's better to be able to speak to God straight from the heart in another tongue. The most beautiful thing I learned about speaking to God in French is that when we pray we use the informal second person "tu" as opposed to the more respectful but distant "vous". This is lovely because it means that when I speak with God, I speak with him as someone close beside me, not far away.

Notre Père Céleste,

Nous te remercions
pour ta grâce,
pour ta bonté, et
pour ta fidélité.

Nous prions,
pour la joie
et la paix dans le monde

Nous prions ceci au nom de Jésus.
Amen!



O Lord, open thou our lips
and our mouths shall show forth thy praise.

Jolly Folly

Last night, we had a party. A Jolly Fall-i-day party. A costume party. We made pies and truffles and caramel corn and funnel cake. We set out chips and salsa and guacamole and crackers and cheese. We offered hot spiced cider and coffee. We had piles and piles of cookies. We made candy sushi out of rice krispies treats and fruit roll ups. We rearranged the furniture. There were sugar cookies to decorate. I dressed up like the Riddler from Batman. My other roommates dressed up like 1) An Avatar, 2) The Count from Sesame Street, 3) A Dolly, 4) An annoying next door neighbor in a bathrobe, 5) a Ninja, 6) A Hot Topic model, 7) Sara from the show Chuck (her boyfriend came as Chuck). We played the Nightmare Before Christmas on the TV in the garage. We sang Christmas carols. We put floating tea light candles in the pool. We played Apples-to-Apples and other Christian party games. We laughed and mingled and talked for hours. All the guys from our "brother house" came over. My best friend came dressed up like the Queen of Hearts. We tossed whipped cream up into the air and tried to catch it in our mouths.

I don't like parties.

OK, I like tea parties, but that's it.

I think there was a time in my life when I found parties interesting, but that phase has passed on. It really has. I like hosting parties about one billion times more than I like going to them, but still. I hate parties. What is wrong with me that I think fun is boring?? I like tea parties because they're all about drinking tea and looking at pretty things and sitting down and eating scones with clotted cream and having conversations with your bosom friends. That's the only kind of party I ever want to have or ever want to go to.

Why am I 97 years old? I had several moments last night where I remembered the last time I lived in a house with a bunch of women and had parties all the time. That was 5 years ago. I think I've died and been reincarnated into my exact same life. That is punishment enough. Thanks be to God that I'm graduating in the Spring. I'll be 25 then. That ought to mean something, right? I need something to change.
I need life to be more than rolling up gummy worms in rice crispies treats before a party. More than making sure guests have places to sit and anxiously awaiting any lulls in conversation. More than painting my roommate blue and trying to make sure we stash all the last-minute piles of homework and books underneath the furniture. More than wrapping up all the extra pies at the end of the night and not getting to bed before 1:30 am.
My favorite part of the whole night was after everything was cleaned up and everyone had gone to bed and all the lights were off. I went into the living room and sat down in one of those big, round Ikea chairs. It was the best moment of my entire week.

If it were within my power to join a convent, I'd do it now.

Trinkets make me feel loved.

I feel SO loved today. Why? Because I'm eating spaghetti and chocolate layer cake for lunch made by my roommate Kaitlin; because I'm wearing earrings and bangles from my friend Katelyn in India; because I will eat Jamaican food for dinner tonight sent from my home by my mama; because I have rainbow ribbon ballet flats that used to belong to my friend Emily; because I have pretty pink Gerber daisies on the coffee table beside me from my roommate Melissa; because I'm using for a bookmark a postcard from my friend Amber in New Mexico; because I hugged a lot of Kindergartners today. I love stuff. Judge me if you need to. I love having pretty things around me that remind me of the dear ones far away. And, let me tell you, 98% of all the dear ones there are, are far away. It's the saddest thing. But it makes me feel better to drink from the little white teapot that served as a centerpiece at my friend Jenn's wedding in Idaho; or to wear the cameo that was my bridesmaid gift from Bethany who's living in Istanbul. I am not denying my materialism. I should probably sell all I have and give it to the poor and seek treasure in heaven. But, the point is, that being surrounded by aesthetically pleasing, visual reminders of friendship is really important to me.

That's why I've got so much stuff. That's why when I'm homesick for a place it's the trees I miss most. It's raining today.

In the Spider's Web

Today I'd like to talk about networking. I'd like to talk about how networking is the number one piece of advice professors give on how to be successful for the rest of your life. I'd like to talk about how much I hate networking. I'd like to talk about how evil it is to use people.

Is there anything more to say? I'd like someone to explain to me how we all even manage to get away with networking when everyone knows what we're up to. Why don't I just start walking up to people and say, "Hi. I'm Ayodele. No, no Eye-O-Del-Ly. No, Eye-O-Del-Ly. Yes, sure you've got it. I'm only talking to you because I want to be able to use our shallow relationship to get ahead in life. Yes, this means even getting ahead of you. No, I don't love you and I think you're wearing an ugly shirt. I find your laugh pretentious, but hey, networking makes the world go 'round".

Yes, this is what I'll start to do. Instead of going out of my way to avoid awkward small talk, and no one goes to greater lengths than I to avoid awkward small talk, I will now try to find moments to network. I will throw myself into a lifestyle I've painstakingly tried to avoid for the past 24 1/2 years. I will smile that fake smile. I will laugh at jokes that aren't funny. I will remember people's names. I will say things like, "Let's get coffee!" I will catch others in my spider's web. . .and I will suck them dry.

Charlotte A. Cavatica has plenty to say about networking. I will follow her approach.

First I dive at him. Next I wrap him up. Now I knock him out, so he'll be more comfortable.... flies, bugs, grasshoppers, choice beetles, moths, butterflies, tasty cockroaches, gnats, midgets, daddy long legs, centipedes, mosquitoes, crickets - anything that is careless enough to get caught in my web.

Luckily for Charlotte, she doesn't have very discriminating tastes. She'll take everything that comes her way. She makes the most of her opportunities and connections. But wait, isn't this wicked? Let's tell the truth. I'm not so much protesting the wickedness of networking. I'm protesting that I apparently have to start doing something contrary to my nature; and the reality that this painfully prosaic way of life will not in fact make me more virtuous, but less so. WHY? Why has society been designed to bolster the personalities of Type-A Extroverts? Doesn't anyone care about all the vinegary, introverted types like myself who just want to mind their own business and only speak when they have something worth saying?

But I protest. It is wicked to network. This is not the Kingdom paradigm I am working towards. Though my evil may be in failing to show love for enough people, pretending to care about people I'd rather never speak to is not the means of atonement for my own sins.

Thus, there are two choices before me. I can either keep taking the road less traveled to avoid saying hi to that girl in my class, or I can somehow draw deep from the well of God's love and find that the girl in my class is interesting--and precious to me because she is precious to God. Later, when I need her Uncle the V.P. of SOMEWHERE IMPORTANT to write me a reference, I'll be able to make such a request while still keeping my soul.

I should still like to be sedated while I do this. Or maybe I need happy pills. If only I could network with Charlotte A. Cavatica. Because, as she says

I always give them a little anesthetic so they won't feel pain. It's a little service I throw in.

.I want much more than this provincial life.

Autumn's Waif

Update.

My life is the same. As you may have already noticed, this is a post for the post's sake. The last month has been full of back to school things, 7 new roommates, a new house, grad school plans, a new job, and of course the loveliest weather change of the year. Today I am wearing a sundress, cardigan, and tights. Because the sky is that tranquil grey-blue---the kind that makes me want to listen to jazz and drink chai green tea and cuddle and eat squash and bake pies. I love fall. What am I thinking about just now? I wish I knew. I've been feeling so overwhelmed lately, life is really full this year, and I don't like fullness. I do college by living like a desert hermit, and so having things like a house and roommates who are kindred spirits transforms all of my academic fervor into more of a feverish hallucination. Right now, I'm mostly just tired of having to study things I don't care about. I don't want to read Cicero, and think about rhetoric. I want to write a play, and bake a pie, and wear cute sweaters and crazy tights and tramp about in wellingtons and mind my own business and step on crimson leaves and be glad. Just that deep, simple merriment that comes from the comforts of the material world in the year's grey-beard time. I want to take communion from a golden chalice at an Anglican church, I want to turn into the spirit of autumn, and participate in a glorious Bacchic frenzy.

Oh, to be the spirit of an autumn wind!

I want to read poetry, and write poetry, and hear poetry, and snap my fingers. I want to waltz across my wooden floor. I want to paint with gold and red and blue! Fall is full of surprises and secrets. Perhaps because Christmas is at the end of it. Autumn, the season of promise--what a fullness of life is fall! Fall is not the decay and corruption of old age, it is the maturity, the fullness of a life well lived. It is a red rose fully bloomed, just before the petals start to wilt. And if death is what comes after, then death itself is a beautiful gift, because it's all wrapped up in a smoky, cloudy haze of awful mystery, and I love it.

Everything is richer now; truer, bolder. Not happy, but joyful. Not pretty, but beautiful. Not well brought up, but well preserved. Regal. Mature. Real.

How full is fall!