gratitude and fear....

The other day I was walking to one of the classes I teach. As I was crossing the green tree-lined south-suburban campus a wave of gratitude just washed over me. I felt the cool fall breeze coupled with the warm sun and was thankful to be alive in that moment. I thought about the many amazing blessings that I have and how wonderful it is to be in this time of my life right now. I am genuinely thrilled with my daily life. Sometimes that happens to me, a moment where I'm just overcome briefly with gratefulness for my life. I wish I could live in that moment more often, so much more commonly I'm caught up in the racing emotions of live that distract me from focusing on the important, life-giving ones.

For example, the feeling of fear. In counseling I'd probably tell a client that feeling afraid is adaptive to a certain extent, it helps us to survive in our surroundings (particularly if there is something legitimately to be afraid of in our lives). But for me fear is complicated, not always helpful but not always unhelpful either. Like many people, I can get trapped in fear and paralyzed by it so I work hard to keep it at bay. Sometimes I'm more successful than other times. This week I heard on our block that several houses have gotten robbed. Now, on the one hand feeling afraid can be helpful when hearing this news, it causes me to make sure I'm aware of what's going on around me. It helps me to remember to set my house alarm when necessary and it keeps me focused on safety. But it can also be paralyzing, because for me the fear of getting broken into is an old one that taps into something from my early years. When we were discussing this the other night MSD asked why this fear gets to me when so many other things don't seem to stir up any worry on my part. I believe the way he put it was, "I'm not used to you being the one worried about something, that's usually my job..." So true, so true.

I tried to put into words my experience as a 6th grader whose house had just been robbed and explain the vulnerability that comes when you don't feel safe and secure anymore. What I realized is that when that fear of getting robbed comes up I go back to being that 11-year-old girl trying to hide her cd player in the covers of her bed to protect it. A little kid doing whatever she could to save her precious treasures. Even at the time I knew that my efforts were useless, if someone broke into our home they could easily find anything I hid. I couldn't stop it from happening, even if I tried my hardest.

And that's really it, there is nothing I can do to protect my life and keep bad things from happening. I can spend tons of energy worrying and trying to safeguard my belongings and loved ones but ultimately there is nothing I can do to stop evil from wrecking havoc in my life. Now I don't say all of that to be depressing, in fact I find it rather liberating. I can't save myself so I have to quit trying. Instead I want to live in moments of gratitude and thankfulness for the blessings in my days.

Easier said than done. There is a balance to be sought, an attempt to value this world and it's tremendous potential and recognize my own powerlessness in the midst of pain, hopelessness and despair. I am always working on creating that balance in a way that tips the scale towards greater hope in the things that last, such as relationships, love and kindness. Those are the moments I want more of in my life.

Yesterday afternoon the weather was really fabulous here, sunny 

but breezy with a hint of coolness in the air... have I mentioned that I love fall??? 

We took a quick trip over to one of our favorite places in the city, Garfield Park Conservatory, unfortunately this summer they have had major damage due to the hailstorms but the grounds are still open for walking. As the sun was going down we enjoyed an early evening stroll through the paths. It's quite the oasis in our urban center... 

Here's Nemo exploring the grass... I can't believe she's 10 months old already... 

hummm counting my fingers...

what is my daddy doing?

oh he's acting crazy so I'll look at him!

students....

Not much to say tonight, but one kind of funny thing....

I taught this weekend and to spice up the afternoon I showed my students a couple of pictures of Nemo. One of my students saw this picture and remarked that we look like a "cute indie family" then she followed that up with "you should start a band."

These two pictures I just like ...

Ahhh summer adventures, the cool weather this weekend is reminding me that the summer is coming to a close... and the summer adventures are just fond sunny memories .... 

on to the next season!

visiting preschool...

This past weekend we had a good time visiting Grandma Nancy in pre-school at ICC. 

picking peaches...

I love the fall and I've been waiting for a fall like this for quite a while. This past week Nemo and I did something that I hope to make an annual ritual. We headed to Cranes Orchard in Fennville Michigan to pick some peaches. We had a great time playing with Grandma in the orchard and came home with a ridiculous amount of peaches... here's a few pics from the day...

Nemo devoured this peach- we thought she was just sucking on the outside but she had managed to use her bottom teeth to bite through the skin! She was quiet for a few minutes and when looked she had peach juice all over herself!

We'll be back for apples in a few weeks!

Another book report...

I recently finished the above book, Sarah's Key, as part of my crazy book reading blitz lately. This was a book that apparently is quite popular, I think a movie is being made out of it? MSD just picked it up from amazon for me a while ago when he was buying books he thought I might like. So I'm game to read a lot of different things and this novel presented some interesting story lines. So I read it and I now I'm kind of undecided about my overall opinion. On one hand I really like the way the past and present are woven together and function as a key part of the plot. Additionally, the historical context (Jews, Nazi's and deportation/death) in France was fascinating to read about. I enjoyed the novel's critical analysis of how human's can easily forget their participation in genocide even against their own people. It offered quite a critique of the larger human tendency to "move quickly past" items in history that are painful (hello! slavery in our country). Anyway that theme of what does it mean to remember is present throughout and I found that pretty interesting.

But the novel over all didn't feel that compelling. I still can't quite place my reasons why not but my gut feeling was that I didn't feel that connected to the characters or inhabited by the story. Perhaps it was the main character- she had this drive to find out about the little girl, Sarah, but aside from a few chance contextual factors it didn't seem that this compulsion was well explained. The reader is just sort of left to assume that this is a normal thing for a woman to simply drop everything to chase after this child's story. Now the story is interesting and certainly complex. But I wasn't drawn in to the storyline as I normally feel that I am in a novel. I would say that while interesting it wasn't a book that I would hand over to others to read- so I'd give it about a B overall.

There's another 5th grade book report, I'm sure there will be more to come but I have to turn my attention to preparing for the three classes I'm teaching this fall... oy!

a new rhythm ...

This is the first autumn season in a long time where nothing new or life-changing is on the horizon. Last fall I was preparing to have a baby and the one before that I was starting a new job, and the one before that was spent acclimating to internship and finishing my dissertation. But this fall is just me and some familiar routines (i.e. jobs I've been doing for a while and some semblance of order in the rest of my life). Nemo is big enough to be ready to explore areas of our city or simply run errands around town. She's also getting into a schedule, aka slightly more predictable (though now that I wrote that it will change tomorrow). So this fall I'm looking forward to crisp weather and making applesauce. But mostly I'm looking forward to simply living without any major tasks on the docket.

That isn't to say that I haven't been considering all the projects I'd like to finish around the house and professionally. There are always plenty of things to do! MSD would tell you that I've always got five more things planned than I have time to complete. But for the first time in a long time I feel more ready to slowly tackle them at whatever pace I need to. Maybe it's having passed the licensing exam and feeling free of that worry hanging over my head, perhaps it's the great rest we had on vacation in Montana that is re-energizing me for the school year ahead. I know that it's partly to do with MSD being done with his tenure process and his simply going into a school year not burdened by extraneous projects. Things feel a bit simpler, more low key and for that I'm grateful.

I do have to teach several classes this fall, two of which are new preps. So that will take time and energy to manage and prepare for well. But even there, I know the institutions as I've taught at them before and I know the material since I've just been through a lot of it again in preparation for the licensing exam. It's nice to feel as though there is not some big looming newness out there that I have to ready myself for.

So a new rhythm is at work here in our house, my hope is that it plays for a long time. I am looking forward to the events of fall and beyond that to the holidays. Perhaps it's because we are both teachers but autumn always feels like a fresh start and a new beginning (even though from a calendar perspective it's really the end of the year). Here's to all the crisp fall weather ahead of us!