Anne

I truly, honestly don't get star-struck.  In fact, I typically roll my eyes at people who do.  Why would we get all googly-eyed at someone that we, the public, made famous?  Isn't the real miracle the fact that by buying their record, or their book, or going to their movies or whatever, we made them that way? Wealthy and famous?  Yes, I think so.  We should be walking around high-fiving each other, hooping and hollering at the power we have to make or break people, don't ya think?  

There's my rant about that.  

(I must disclose, however, that I was awe-struck by Bon Jovi a few years ago.  And I even went to the concert asking, "Who is this again?  Would I know any of their songs??"  Totally serious.  He effectively cast his spell on me.   I couldn't help it.  I was blown away.)  

But other than that I'm usually more annoyed than I am impressed.  And with a husband who works in radio with endless passes to concerts, movie premiers and film festivals, meet-and-greets, endorsement gigs, etc, we've met our fair share of uber-famous people.  (I have always appreciated how he's arranged for our little siblings to meet all their idols: The Jonas Brothers, Raven Symone, Aly and AJ, Taylor Swift, blah, blah, blah...) But the vast majority of the time he asks me to go backstage or whatever, I violently opt out and suggest he invite someone else.  I'd much rather pluck my eyebrows anyway. 

But then there's Anne.  Yes, we're friends now so I refer to her simply as Anne.  We're very close.

My dear friend Christine introduced me to her a few years ago, and it was love-at-first-paragraph. Her book Bird by Bird is hands down the best book on writing ever penned in my opinion.  I also loved Traveling Mercies, a memoir on faith.  I confess I don't and haven't loved all her books, but I do love her.  She's just so stinkin' funny and transparent.  She's also terribly introverted, almost elusive.  No facebook, no twitter, no blog, not even a general website.  It honestly baffles me.  How do you sell books in today's economy with no self-marketing whatsoever?  But then again, it kind of makes her all the more mysterious and appealing.

You can imagine my surprise when Erin (of course a devoted Anne Lamott lover) announced that Anne would be in Dallas doing a reading and book signing!  I immediately texted Christine, who also flipped out, and we all started planning and freaking out and screaming how we might pee our pants or fumble our words or something crazy like that up on meeting her.  (Erin and Christine both sorta did, I might add.  Well, no pee, just fumbling and general fear of approaching her stuff. ;-)  

I did not.  I oh-so-bravely raised my hand and asked her a question, in fact.  "Hi Anne.  We're curious why you don't have a website of any kind?"  To which she brilliantly responded (paraphrasing here), "Yes.  Because I'm afraid if I did it would mean I'd actually have to interact with people or do something.  And I wouldn't have anything to say, really.  One day I'd say, 'You can do anything.  Believe in yourself.  You are beautiful and wonderful.' And the next I'd say, 'I hate everyone.  I hate Sam. (her son)  I hate John Boehner. (she's a liberal)  I just hate everyone.' It wouldn't be very life-giving.  It's just better that I don't."

She borders on too honest.  But that's what we love about her.  We all giggled and blushed a little, exchanging happy glances.  Kyle was there too, and Josh played with Luci Belle in the background so Christine wouldn't be so distracted.  She kept blushing every time Belle gleefully screamed quite loudly. Anne kept asking 'the woman with the baby' if she'd like to come to the front and sit on the carpet. Christine declined.  I think that embarrassed her a little, too.  It was so great. I loved it. 

Then the moment came.  We all got in line to meet her.  I ripped a page out of my journal for her to sign having forgotten my books.  Josh snapped photos of all of us acting silly.  We asked her if she was an INFJ (like us), to which she responed, "What's that? Does it mean you're screwed up?  Then, yes." We all giggled again.  

Erin's eyes were closed in her photo so I dragged her back to take another.  She about lost her mind, freaking out the entire time.  Christine down-right refused to go back for a second. It was greatness.  

When Josh and I made it to the car I kept saying I felt like all the world was right.  I wasn't star-struck per se, but I did have this grand feeling of accomplishment.  I spoke to Anne Lamott for goodness sake!  I told Josh, "I don't have a bucket-list or anything, but if I did that would have been on it!"

I feel inspired.  I must have gotten some sort of impartation of something.  I feel like I could write a memoir! ;-)

If there were one person on the planet you'd love to meet in the flesh, who would it be??

Frugalism

I'm on this kick lately.  It involves leaving ripe bananas in really bizarre locations.  

Let me explain...

You see, my Moma taught me to never, ever, under any circumstance throw perfectly good food away. And thanks to her wonderful, frugal teaching, today I have all sorts of complexes regarding the issue.  

I can hear her voice in my head every time I drag the trash can across the kitchen to clean out the fridge..."There are hungry animals in the yard that will eat that."

And every time I empty containers of leftovers down the disposal... "If you'd freeze that it wouldn't go bad and you'd have a perfectly fine meal later."

She even reprimands me for NOT cooking eggshells and returning them to her so she can feed them to her chickens.  Talk about recycling!  (It's so they don't lay soft, fragile eggs...in case you're wondering about that weirdo statement.)    

At one point I kept all my used tea leaves and coffee grounds so she could spread them in the garden, but I stopped when they started to mold before I could get them to her.  Frugalism does have its limits, after all.

But the worst for me, the worst is when I toss out produce, the kind that's super-ripe but definitely still edible. I can see her silently shaking her head, a look of total disappointment scrawled across her face. If it were her, you see, she'd can it.  Or make some sort of jam or jelly out of it.  Or pickle it.  Or something.  At her very worst she'd feed it to her goats or pigs or dogs or whatever beast is roaming around in the yard.

But in the city I don't have goats or pigs.  And I'm too lazy to jam or jelly or can or pickle for the sake of saving produce.  However still totally convicted by my mother's ever-resounding-inside-my-head-principle, I've finally discovered my own solution:  

I leave things on the sidewalk.  (If you could see me right now I'd be grinning ear to ear, beaming with pride at my genius-ness!)

You think I'm kidding.  I'm not. It all started one night because I had this gigantic bowl of perfect apples and oranges that were sure to go bad when Josh and I left town for several days.  I kept racking my brain trying to figure out who to give them to, when suddenly it dawned on me!  So many homeless and hungry people criss-cross over Swiss Ave on a daily basis, why not leave them on the street??  So I piled them all in a bag and crept downstairs, let myself out the gate, and plopped them just off the sidewalk to avoid tripping anyone. I rolled the sides of the bag down to showcase the little beauties and dashed contentedly back inside.  Within a few hours, they were gone!  It was like a magic trick!  I bragged and bragged about my genius-ness to Josh.  He feigned enthusiasm.

But ever since that night, whenever I'm standing over the garbage can with a couple of ripe bananas, I just can't do it.  I can't throw them away. Someone could eat these.  A little homeless man would be delighted to find a ripe banana on the sidewalk, I think to myself.  Or maybe the hard working woman who's been on her feet for 12 hours but still has to walk 10 blocks home.  Wouldn't she be happy to find a free snack on her little commute?  That might make her evening!

So I creep down the back steps, slip thru the gate, make sure no one is watching, and play fruit Santa! Like magic they always disappear, sometimes within minutes.  

I admit I get a kick out of it, watching the fruit disappear, wondering who's picking it up and what must be going thru their heads.  Can't you imagine how funny that must be??  Walking along and suddenly there's groceries on the sidewalk!  I bet they look around confused, wondering if it's a joke.  

But I have to be blatantly honest.  It has absolutely nothing to do with good will or feeding the hungry. It's entirely about silencing the Jiminy Cricket voice inside my head, the one who sounds exactly like my mother.  

If my intention were to feed the hungry, I'd feel like crap for giving them leftovers.  This is not about that. This is simply avoiding wastefulness.  It isn't about anyone else, it's about me--let's just put that right out there lest anyone accuse me of thinking myself the Mother Teresa of random sidewalk produce.  

Point and case: Last week our friend Aaron was in town, lamenting over the chicken sandwich he'd brought with him from Philly the day before.  He was too nervous to eat it but said he wanted to feed it to a stray dog.  (He obviously has a complex too, growing up in the inner city of Philadelphia.)  I immediately piped up, "Oh!  Leave it on the sidewalk!  I do it all the time.  Someone will eat it!"

He looked at me disgusted, "Terrica, it's chicken.  I don't want to make some little homeless guy sick! I am not leaving it on the sidewalk."

I slumped against the counter, defeated.  "Oh, I guess you're right...that would be cruel."

Frugalism does have limits, after all.  

But I think my Moma would be proud.  Or perhaps simply not disappointed.  At the very least, she'd get it kick out of my nonsense.  And I rejoice that I have effectively silenced Jiminy Cricket.  Though unconventional, mission accomplished. ;-)

C'mon, I know you do something crazy, too!  To save money?  To avoid waste?  Tell me about it!

Celebration

This man.

He has my heart.

And for the last many days we've celebrated... him.

Friends arriving from far and wide.  Long dinners, cooked together. Presents, dancing in the kitchen, late nights chatting the night away on the porch. Whispered prayers and blessings, reflecting on Faithfulness, beautiful anticipation of all that's before him.  Friends gathering at sunset, tables dragged together, snacks and wine and laughter passed round.  A Broadway show, a lovely evening tea, late hours in the reading room sharing our hearts, wrapped in cozy blankets. 

And we aren't done yet. Celebrations and dinners and travels still await us, await him.

28 was challenging.  28 was life-changing.  28 saw dreams realized.

29 will be better.

This man.  This man full of destiny, cloaked in favor, surrounded by Divinity, determined to do His will.  And he is.

Happy birthday, love.  You have my heart.  You have His heart.  And as always, the best is yet to come...

Sunlight

Every morning I whip the blanket off their crate, unlatch it and tell them "Good morning, girls!  Good morning, good morning!"

They're usually still sleepy-eyed, rockin' the bed head look, and they'll slink from their crate and stretch their tiny backs and legs, then slowly start to prance about my feet with enthusiasm.  I'll squat down and scratch their little heads, picking them up for a quick morning squeeze.

They'll wait for me to complete whatever task is next on my list, all the while waiting by the utility closet door.  The longer I make them wait the more anxious they'll get, whimpering and whining at first, resorting to barking if necessary.  When I finally decide they've waited long enough I'll retrieve their morning treat from the closet. They'll jump and dance about in ecstatic circles, bouncing off my legs again and again.  Then I'll open the door to the reading room full of warm, morning sun, as they race inside with their treasures.

They'll each find a patch of sunlight and settle in for a leisurely morning.  They won't move from their warm little patches of light until the sun rises high enough in the sky to escape the grasp of the windows.  

Every morning is the same, girls in patches of sunlight.  

And every morning it reminds me again,

I want to lay in the Sun today too, if only for a moment.  I want to curl up with a book somewhere in the Sun and let it's warmth soak into bones, let it heal me body and soul.  Yes, that's what I'll do.  Yes, that's what I must do.

Sometimes it's literal sunlight, sometimes metaphorical, but every day I intentionally seek out a ray of light here or there and soak it in... a great chapter from Anne Lamott, a deep orange egg yolk spilling over a slice of buttery toast, a warm conversation with someone I love, a quiet evening walk down Swiss with my husband...patches of sunlight.  A deeply felt psalm, a moment of realization and teaching, a silly laugh standing in my kitchen just because...patches of sunlight.  An encouraging email from an old friend, watering the little pots on our porch, a steaming cup of tea that warms from the inside out...patches of sunlight.

Don't miss them.  Even on dark and dreary days, don't miss them.  They matter.

What are the patches of sunlight in your everyday?

Real

Ivana and I do this thing.  We’ve done it for years, especially since Josh and I moved to Texas and she and Ryan moved to South Carolina.  It’s where in lieu of an actual conversation on the phone, we leave each other long messages.  I mean, long.  In fact, we fill up the entire 4-minute message capacity and then call back, sometimes twice, for a total of almost 12 minutes.  Once I even left her 4.  (But I thought she might kill me if I ever did it again, so to date, I haven’t.  She does have two babies to tend to and all…) And if either of us ever happens to actually pick up the phone, a rare occurrence, we freak out a bit and tell her to hang up immediately and NOT answer when we call right back!

It’s our thing.  And we do it well.  No one really gets it but us.  We’re introverts, we’re artistic personality types, we don’t enjoy long, awkward phone conversations with anyone, even each other…so we leave messages.  It works for us.

Recently she left me a wonderful 1st message commenting on my blog, and life, and the world at large…but I could hear something else behind her voice she wasn’t saying.  Then came message 2, again full of updates and thoughts and current books she’s reading…and then a minute or so in, she spilled. She said she was attempting to be shallow and keep things on the surface level, and then she paused, “…but let’s be real…let me tell you what’s really going on in my heart…”

My ears perked up.  A silly grin spread across my face.  My heart warmed.

There she is.  The girl I adore, my forever friend, my Ivana.

She went on to share her frustrations and concerns, the things she’s working thru in her heart.  It only took another minute or so, but in that moment she didn’t feel the literal thousand miles away, she felt a breath away.  As far as I was concerned she might as well have been sitting in my living room sipping a hot vanilla chai.  I could see her face, her blue eyes.  I could peer into her heart. 

Authentic relationships.  Real relationships.  Inspiring relationships, the ones that stir your soul and point you towards greatness again and again.  They’re worth fight for, and boy do I.

Ivana can tell you we’ve had a few screaming matches.  We’ve hurt each other, offended each other.  Once I even blatantly walked out of a room and slammed a door while she sat sobbing.  We’ve shared secrets and fears, all of our worst possible thoughts about being wives and mothers.  We’ve disagreed, we’ve argued, we’ve even yelled at each other’s husbands more than once and then gotten upset at each other for doing so.

It’s a real relationship. 

We’ve certainly grown and matured over the years beyond a lot of our early adulthood stupidity and opinions, but the secret to our success is simple: We keep fighting.

We keep reaching out, forgiving each other again and again.  We keep reminding each other that we’re understood, that expectations within the context of relationship suck, and that we’re loved and celebrated every single day, if only by each other.  We offer one another a safe place to say all the truly terrible things we fear saying out loud to anyone else, a place where judgment really is nonexistent, miraculously.  We make the other laugh, especially when we most need it.  We tell each other the truth, particularly when we don’t believe it.  And we force ourselves over and over and over again, beyond the thin veil that separates shallow conversation from life-altering truth, the kind that requires prayer and thought and deep, scary, raw honesty.  The kind that requires bravery.

And when we make it, sometimes by tiptoe or sometimes a brazen stomp that rips right thru the veil without a backward glance, we celebrate.  She cheers, I clap, we let out sighs of relief and victory, perhaps a nervous, thankful giggle. And then most importantly, in the silence that follows, we whisper to one another one more time…don’t stop telling the truth.  Don’t stop baring your soul.  Because it helps me.  In every way you cannot understand and in every way you do, it helps me.  Keeping fighting for me, and I will keep fighting for you.  We’ll do it together.

I fight for the people I love.  And without question or exception, that means fighting with them.  In recent weeks I’ve had difficult, gut-wrenching conversations with just about everyone close to me.  Choking, fear-laden conversations that have forced me to gasp for breath out of sheer terror I’d walk away without them, having been rejected at the very soul-level.  It’s required a lot of truth telling, a lot of second or third or forty-fifth chances and leaps of faith.  But I believe it’s worth it.  I’ve offended people, I’ve been wounded, I’ve told the truth equally about both the beauty and ugliness of my heart.  I’ve apologized, they’ve apologized, I’ve cried and over-analyzed and felt entirely alone and misunderstood.  Family, my husband, friends…no one seems to have escaped the shake-up. 

And I know it isn’t over.  In all honesty, it’s never over.  As long as we move and breathe there will be offense and glory, death and redemption, hope dashed, and hope restored.

I don’t think I’m capable of shallow relationships.  Really, I don’t.  I just don’t know how to do them.  I never have.  If they remain shallow beyond a few conversations or if my probes for depth and honestly are met with constant resistance, you’ll soon see me silently exiting stage left, slipping out quietly, hopefully unseen.

And because of the intensity with which I do relationship, it isn’t unusual to see other people exiting stage left, sometimes quietly, sometimes not so much.  And I get it, I do.  I’m admittedly a bit of an extremist, there’s little middle ground with me, and sometimes people aren’t quite ready for that.  However, I’m also not capable of suddenly not loving a person I’ve ever loved deeply, so in a sense, I’m still fighting even for those who’ve walked away from me with deliberate intention.  I always will be on some level, whether they’re aware of it or not, and I’ve found a great deal of peace in that.

But for those who’ve stayed to fight like Ivana and so many others, you know who you are… thank you.  I’m with you.  I won’t leave this sacred ground.  My feet are planted.  Despite blood and tears and tragedy, horror and offense and fears realized…my feet are planted. 

Keep telling the truth.  Keep calling back.  Keep arguing until we understand, until we believe.  Keep encouraging.  Keep laughing.  Keep telling secrets and fears and hopes.  Keep baring your soul.

Keep fighting.

It won’t ever be easy, but it’s what real relationships are made of.  And in my opinion, those are the only ones that matter.  At the end of the day I’d rather have one Ivana than a thousand pleasant acquaintances.  That’s the simple truth.

Do you fight for the people you love?  Do you press for depth and honesty, even when it’s painful and scary?

Ladies

I was sitting on the porch yesterday (in my garden ;-) when my sweet friend Kyle walked up with these...

Tulips.  My forever favorite.  No particular reason, just an "I celebrate you today, welcome to Spring."

And then tonight Tommy, Linda, Josh and I drove across town to say hi to the Bailey's and try a new chocolate almond butter tart at their store.  As we were sitting around chatting, Christine presented Linda and I each with one of these:

She hand-painted them herself of course, a little reminder of healing, a process we're each in... all the time... in some way or another.  And we choose to celebrate that, too, in our own lives and each others.  (I think mine will find it's way to my wee garden sometime very soon ;-)

Such authentically beautiful friends.  I'm so grateful for the individual women in my life, all of them, each of them.  I'm so thankful to have ladies in my everyday who know and celebrate me for all the right and meaningful reasons, and for no reason at all.  Just because.  I'm not sure there's a more wonderful feeling on the planet than being celebrate... just for being you.

How do you celebrate the women in your life?  Or how do they celebrate and encourage you?