Nothing long or detailed today, just a few brief updates to break the blog silence.
- Life update: My brother Brock and sister Abby came to visit! In a whirlwind five days, we took them to Pampaneira, Cabo de Gata, Almeria, the Mediterranean beach, and Granada. This was easier than it sounds: all these places are within two hours’ drive. And I failed to realize how much smoother traveling with small children is when you have two childless adults to help pick up dropped toys, distribute snacks, and carry tired children. But for me, the highlight of their visit was getting to know them again. Two years apart is a long time to maintain a long-distance relationship, even for family. People change, often in small quiet ways, and if you’re not there to see it, you usually miss it. So I had a fairly literal “reunion” with my siblings (with two of the eight of them, that is), and I’m happy to report they’re even more outstanding than they used to be. (Brock, I see that eye roll.)
- Book recommendation, but first, a note about book recommendations: please take my recommendations with a grain of salt. My standards and tastes are not always going to be your standards and tastes, and I am not the Holy Spirit speaking into your life. I hope I’m a helpful resource, but as always, don’t check your discernment at the door. Okay, note over. Here is my recommendation: A Place For Us, by Fatima Farheen Mirza, the story of Indian-American Muslims living in California. This book will be especially loved by fans of literary fiction, so if you don’t like that genre, maybe give it a pass (but also maybe give it fifty pages?). The prose is gorgeous, the plot slow and character-focused, the characters richly drawn and developed. This book broke my heart in the best way. By its end, there wasn’t a single character I didn’t at least respect—even the ones I didn’t want to like. Mirza does so well at portraying the internal emotions and thought processes of her characters as they struggle to own and live out their faith. I cried, and then I read the last paragraphs out loud to Ryan, and then I immediately texted a friend about it and bought her the book so we could discuss it together (she loved it too, by the way). I felt and learned so much from this novel, and a book for both the mind and the heart is a beautiful thing indeed. (Also, for literary fiction fans, I kept thinking of Marilynne Robinson while I was reading it, and then read the acknowledgements and discovered that (1) Mirza is my age and (2) she studied under Marilynne Robinson. I’m not jealous, at all.)
- Currently learning: That often I make my closest friendships by waiting for the other person to go first: with a smile, small talk, a confession, a problem, an opinion. And then I smile in relief and say, “Me too!” And that is that. But here and now, I usually need to initiate. And initiating is hard. I’m trying to remember how comforting it is to sink into the shelter others provide me with their vulnerability, in an effort to inspire myself to be the shelter. Still hard (shelters get weathered and worn). But still good. (Concept of going first inspired by some random Instagram post by some wise person whose name I can’t recall)
- Currently learning, part two: That whenever I make a significant decision or move forward, fear and second-guessing and discouragement are never far behind. And that, for me, this usually does not mean I made the wrong move.
These last two points will probably be their own blog post, sometime. But right now, the lessons are still too current to expound on. I need to turn a few more pages, take some more tests, and let them shape my brain and heart a bit more.
This Motley Crew 