Thanksgiving

It seems my last few posts have been pretty heavy, and I have to admit, life has felt pretty heavy lately.  I’ve had to make a lot of those real-live grown-up life choices, and the outcome isn’t always what we want it to be.  We surprise ourselves with how much we still care about what others think.  We surprise ourselves with how easy it is to make really bad choices.  How hard it can be to stay true to yourself and others. 

But today, as I sit in my childhood home, surrounded by the sights and smells I’ve known as home since I was 2, I find myself feeling overwhelmingly lucky.  And seeing that it is Thanksgiving, it seems a fitting time to post something to this blog that I've ignored for too many weeks now about just how blessed I really am. 

Two nights ago, as I drove up the mountain range and back down again into the valleys of Western North Carolina, I had a moment of forgetting all the things and people that have been resting heavily on my heart and my conscience.  I’ve written about this experience before—this “coming home” moment when the whole world seems to feel right again.  When I can take a deep breath and relax.  When I feel like no matter what’s happening in the big, bad world around me, that it’s likely it’ll all be okay, at least for the next few days. 

Even in darkness, there is something startlingly beautiful about these mountains.  The way the fog wraps around the curves of the landscape, like cotton batting settling into the corners of a well-worn quilt.  The way the moonlight shines off the rocks and the purple-blue hues that in sunlight twinkle in shades of lavender and periwinkle become rich and deep like midnight blue and eggplant.  The way the rivers and creeks wind through the hills like long, thin snakes in search of lower ground.  The way that white-boarded churches and stone houses nestle on the edges of sloping land, and despite the darkness, these places feel full.  How the outline of the mountain range dances with the night sky, and there are spots that are indeterminable as land or cloud or tree.

These images and the cool, autumnal mountain air provide space for pause.  And reflection.  After a few days of being home, I begin to relax.  I begin to turn off my Baltimore brain and think about the things that are really important.  Granted, as everyone in my family has gotten older and life has become increasingly more complicated, my holiday time has become sacred and my time has become divided.  Life mandates that I divide my vacation weeks into clumps of mini-vacations with all the people that I love all around the world.  And despite not seeing everyone at once, I remember how lucky I am to have so many places to visit; so many people to call family. 

And though it still feels like the world may be going to hell in a bobsled, there are still things happening all around us for which we must remain thankful. 

I remain thankful for my friends and family.  You are the macaroni to my cheese; the people who keep me going, who keep me laughing, and who keep me grounded.  For reminding me when I’m being a giant, gaping asshole and for reminding me, too, when I’ve done something right.  When I’ve done something good.  I’m thankful for all of our blessings and I’m even thankful for all of our flaws (as my family reads: “Huh!? WHAT FLAWS!? DON’T WRITE THIS SHIT ON THE INTERNET!”).  It’s useful to be reminded just how close we all are to being cast in Days of Our Lives.  And how lucky we are to have natural good looks, in the event that a camera crew ever shows up.

I’m thankful for the community of thinkers and artists I find myself surrounded by everyday.  I’m thankful for the inspiration and creativity I find in my students and colleagues, for the idealism they hold for the future, and for the change they want in the world— and the possibilities they find so imminent and real.

I’m thankful for all the men and women who wake up everyday and contribute something back to their community.  Who raise their children to be kind and honest.  Who fight for justice and equality.  Who don't lay back and accept the status quo but who use their voices and their brains when they’re outraged.  Who vote.  Who listen.  Who care.

I’m thankful that someone invented boxed cake mix (because it's just so good and cheap).  And that when you add butter to sugar with cream, you get frosting.  And how nicely bacon compliments bourbon.    

I’m thankful that I can see the humor in life.  That I can laugh everyday.  I’m thankful that Sarah Palin’s reality show will likely be her demise.  I’m thankful that people with a lot of time on their hands still make ridiculous videos on Youtube so that I have something to watch in the middle of the night when I’m battling insomnia. 

I’m thankful for the little things.  For the challenges we face, so that we better know ourselves and our world.  For the hardships we encounter so that we have appreciation for what we do have.  For the disagreements we engage in, so that we can come to an agreement.  For the messes we make as we grow and learn and try to make sense of the spaces that don't make sense, so that when we clean up it feels that much more satisfying.

I'm thankful for these mountains, for these moments of calm, and for places that feel like home and people who feel like family.  For love and kindness.  For generosity.  For memories.  For the future.

Happy Thanksgiving, friends. 

Cheers

Keeping up with a blog isn’t as easy as it seems—no wonder some of these career bloggers have literally made blogging a career. As in, they don’t leave their houses in the morning. As in, they have no professional obligations outside of blogging. As in, they introduce themselves at cocktail parties as “writers” but in reality, they’re bloggers who sit in their buffet pants all day and read things like DListed and the NYtimes and 100 OTHER blogs and online newspapers for inspiration. I’m going steady at 2 blog posts a month, something I’m not quite proud of, but I remind myself that I WORK for a living. And while I make a genuine effort to include as much spandex content in my work wardrobe as possible, I’m often forced to join the rest of the American workforce in standard black pants, heels, and pearls, and earn a living. Therefore among many (many) resolutions for 2010, blogging is back on the top of my list.

That isn’t to say I don’t think about writing my thoughts down all the time—but by the time I’m home, with my laptop, I find myself doing something a bit less brain-straining, like Facebook-stalking. Or online shoe-shopping. Or searching craigslist for something cheap and/or weird. So my thoughts and grand schemes for the world are put on hold, waiting for my dreams or for the next day.

It seems the holidays are always an appropriate time for a quick life audit; a check-up (an honest one) of all the challenges and successes of 2009. Over the last few weeks I’ve found myself reading the “life audits” of all my friends and family; you know what I’m talking about—the long, often rambling, letters that update us all on all the amazing things that have happened since the last holiday card hit the post. Some of these letters I find touching, others merely nauseating. Like I’m really shocked that your daughter is engaged—we all knew she’s been sleeping with that bi-polar criminal for years now. She’s probably just pregnant and decided to be classy about it. Let’s be honest.

So here is my letter, the one I didn’t tuck in all of my holiday cards.

Dear Friends and Family,

I couldn’t begin to list all the amazing things I accomplished in 2009—primarily because I don’t keep lists like this, but more importantly because I know no one else cares about why I’m amazing. You already know this about me, intrinsically, and don’t need to see quantitative nor qualitative data to support such claims.

I’d prefer, instead, to list the things for which I’m most thankful, because it’s easy to give thanks when you’re such a lucky girl.

My official list of THANKS as 2009 comes to a close:
I’m thankful for…

• a supportive, albeit ape-shit nuts, family that is hilarious and functionally dysfunctional;
• my amazingly creative and inspiring friends who always help me finish the bottle of wine (and sometimes open a third one), who laugh at my stories and reciprocate with even better ones, who eat my cooking and say it’s good, and who continue to do good things in the world, despite the fact that it all appears to be going to hell in a bobsled;
• my goofy, cat-hating beast I call a dog who makes me laugh, even at 6:45 in the morning;
• vodka tonics, laughter, jigsaw puzzles, best friends, stretch pants and docks (and yes, those are all related);
• learning how mistakes are an important part of wearing my big-girl panties;
• Tarheel basketball;
• cocoa butter;
• the ability to make bad dates into great stories;
• good hair product;
• buffalo chicken dip;
• jeans that look like dress pants;
• happy hours that go until last call;
• Chico’s (because where would I be without it).

So cheers to 2010. Raise a glass of whatever you're drinking (or just the bottle, I don't judge) and sing as much of auld lang syne as you can remember.

Let’s be thankful, shall we? Wishing you all peace, health, and happiness in the New Year.

Love,
Lindsay