Ten

Sell yourself in 10 words or less.

Hmm.

Okay.

(Wait. Those don’t count, right? Right? Don’t count those, okay?)

Ten words….

 

love, elizabeth

Making History: Or why your blog matters

Doing some reading for my prospectus tonight, I was reading Peter Burke’s thoughts on microhistory. In it, he quotes an anthropologist named Clifford Geertz who writes about the need “to ferret out the unapparent import of things.” I’ve been chewing on this little phrase all night and finally realized that this has, unknowingly, been a life principle for me, not just as a scholar but as a writer and a blogger. I am fascinated by the tiny little nothing-detail that means something bigger.

That is what blogging has become for me – an opportunity to “ferret out” the important truth inside the day-to-day-everydayness. It’s amazing to me how blogging becomes a way of writing my own microhistory. I could probably write down every teeny life detail, however boring that might be to read, but somehow blogging the little stories tells a big story. And if every blog is a microhistory, then all the blogs in the universe together might tell an even bigger story. This is the strength of the blogger and I have been taking it for granted.

So congratulations. I bet you didn’t know that you, blogger friend of mine, were a micro-historian. Keep on making history.

love, elizabeth

Things Keep Breaking

I seriously love this old, ramshackle apartment. It’s cozy and vintage and it feels exactly like home. But the downside to all that vintage is the way things seem to keep falling apart. The sink is leaky, the cabinet is crooked, and a couple days ago, one of the legs on the bathroom vanity came off. A little part of me went, Ugh! When will things just be perfect so that I can finally enjoy living here?

You know how much I love a good metaphor. This one is hitting me hard today. Things break. Things fall apart. That’s what they do. The car will break. The car will be fixed. It will break again. School will get harder and then easier and then harder again. Money will flow and get tighter and flow again. We’ll get sick again and well again. I could spend the rest of my life waiting for things to stop breaking and start being perfect. And I’ll be waiting a long time.

I keep breaking and am bound up again. Maybe this is what they mean when they say you should live in the moment. I am looking for the joy in the broken. It’s here. Can you see it? 

love, elizabeth

If You Really Knew Me, At All

My childhood best friend, Jenni, did a post like this when she was inspired by her friend Kristin and you all know how I like a good bandwagon so…here I am, hopping aboard.

If you knew me really well, you’d know that…

I’m a total clothes-horse.  Like straight up addict.

But I’m also a thrift-store junkie. So that helps. (Or at least, this is what I tell my husband when he looks at my closet.)

I am really critical of my own appearance. I have had a hard time accepting my body or my shape or my face. I want to believe good things about the person I’ve been created to be but I struggle. A lot.

I worry about everything. In fact, the times that I DON’T worry are of such great significance that I usually celebrate them and promptly spiral into a new round of worry about why I’m not worried and about what I must be forgetting to remember to worry about.

I am a lover of God. My faith-walk can be shaky sometimes but my belief in Him never is. God is good all the time. All the time God is good.

I put ketchup on almost everything. It’s a running joke in my family.

I wish I was braver. Or tougher. Or some combination of the two.

I have been known to dumpster dive for furniture. Although, there has been no actual Diving Into a Dumpster. It’s more like Diving NEXT to a Dumpster. In fact, except for an armchair and our sofa, nothing in the house was purchased new. And if our apartment looks more like a flea market than the inside of a magazine, I guess that’s okay.

I love to go to the movies. It’s the luxury I most enjoy. I look forward to the trailers almost as much as the actual film.

Sometimes on long car trips, I pretend I’m in a music video. … Shut up. Don’t look at me with that tone of voice.

When I don’t want to do something, I imagine how I could possibly write a blog post on the topic and it makes it easier. Blogging has forced me to try new things so that this blog doesn’t get stale. That feels like a life metaphor but I’ll let someone else connect those dots. If you know…they want to.

I would do literally anything for my friends. I think loyalty is more important than neutrality and that has cost me relationships. And I don’t care. I’d rather stand up for one friend than have a hundred thousand more.

I love to spend time with other people but the second I’m alone, I obsess over the interactions we had. Was I annoying? Did I talk too much? Did that person feel cared about? I think this makes me a good friend and conversationalist but I don’t trust myself and I don’t let down my guard very easily. I almost always feel like a burden to others.

I cannot wait to be a parent. But I have to wait. And that’s hard, too.

I want to be a tidy, organized person. But I am often messy and scattered.

Sometimes when I get Kyle’s voicemail, I sing songs that I made up on the spot. I think he likes it.

Your turn. I’d love to know more about you!

love, elizabeth

Celebrate Everything

What would my daily life be like if I intentionally celebrated not just the big stuff but the little stuff, too? Sometimes I think I get so wrapped up in the big picture goals that I forget about all the little baby successes I had along the way. So I’m trying something new…

Source: yogamodern.com via Elizabeth on Pinterest

 

This week I am celebrating…

1. Seeing “Doctor of Philosophy” for the first time below my name on the graduate student photo directory in the lobby. I’m not a PhD yet but seeing those words reminded me how excited I am to be a day closer to my degree.

2. Eating right. I just got back from my Weight Watchers meeting and I lost four pounds!

3. The first real snow in Columbus. It may only have been an inch or so but it was a glorious powdery delight to me and Madigan.

Source: Uploaded by user via Elizabeth on Pinterest

 

I think I’m going to try to do this every week. What about you? What little (and big) successes can you celebrate this week?

love, elizabeth

Wednesdays Are For Lovers

Source: cuteoverload.com via Elizabeth on Pinterest

Today, hold the people you love closer than ever. After all, who knows how many Wednesdays we get?

love, elizabeth

Six Life Lessons from Christmas Movies

1. If you go to an inn in New England with Bing Crosby, there will be smooching.



2. No one can say ‘Merry Christmas’ with the fervor of Jimmy Stewart. No one. (see It’s a Wonderful Life, Shop Around the Corner for exhibits a and b)



3. If anyone shows up and claims to be a messenger, an angel, or a ghost of Christmas past perfect participle, listen to them.

4. Tim Allen knows it. Virginia knows it. The Supreme Court knows it. There is a Santa Claus. Don’t argue.

5. Don’t forget to hire the large ethereal-sounding choir well in advance of your life-altering transformation on Christmas Eve. They book up fast.



6. It’s okay if you burn the dinner, end up in an insane asylum or on a greyhound, fall off the roof, have no money for presents, or feel like jumping off a bridge because if it’s Christmas, there’s always hope.

What about you? What’s your favorite Christmas movie?

love, elizabeth

Death is like taking someone to the airport

via

Sometimes they’re in a hurry and you just drop them at the curb. You leave your hazards on and you pull their suitcase out of the trunk and you hug them and they tell you what a great time they had, how good it was to see you. You know they have to go. Their plane is leaving. They can’t stay any longer.

Sometimes they let you park and come inside with them. You watch them check-in and promise they’re not carrying contraband. You watch them check their bags and you say meaningless things like “Wow, $25 for that little duffel bag…” and “How long is your lay-over in Atlanta? Oh, nice and short then.” You make it as far as security. You need a ticket go on but you don’t have one. Because this is their flight. Not yours.

They shrug and say, “I guess this is it.”

And you say, “Yeah, don’t forget to take off your shoes.”

They head for the back of the line and you call out their name. Just one more hug, one more kiss, one more “I wish we had more time.: One more goodbye.

You’re only prolonging it now but you stand at the top of the stairs and watch their progress through security. You see the wand waving and you see them step through that last metal doorway.

You can’t even see them now but you walk to the impossibly large windows now and stare out, trying to decide which plane is taking them away from you. Eventually, you watch one taxiing down the runway, farther and farther away, faster and faster it goes, until it’s up, up in the air taking someone away from someone else and it just seems so unbelievably unfair.

But it would be selfish, wouldn’t it, to want to keep those planes on the ground forever? It would be selfish to keep those passengers from reaching their destinations.

Today I’m feeling a little selfish and a little sad.

love, elizabeth

PS: I apologize for my absence from blog-land for the past few days. I have been reading your blogs and trying to comment (my log-in wasn’t working). I think things are fixed now and I should be back to regular posting and reading, too. Hope everyone is having a restful weekend!

Living with Abandon

“Just remember, the same as a spectacular Vogue magazine, remember that no matter how close you follow the jumps: Continued on page whatever. No matter how careful you are, there's going to be the sense you missed something, the collapsed feeling under your skin that you didn't experience it all. There's that fallen heart feeling that you rushed right through the moments where you should've been paying attention..."

- Chuck Palahniuk

I don't ever want to feel that collapsed feeling. Am reminded today that my best memories, my happiest hours happened when I truly let go and lived with abandon. So in the spirit of abandon, here are some things I'm doing in the month of October.

Can you guess which thing on this list I am NOT doing?

A. Reporting for jury duty

B. Judging a beauty pageant

C. Performing a vaudeville piece

D. Taking a dance class

E. Driving into the mountains of Pennsylvania

F. Visiting my first haunted house

What about you? What new experiences are you having this month?


love, elizabeth

In-Between Land

I got a call from one of my oldest friends, Kate, this afternoon (oh, by the way, you totally need to check out her awesome new blog, Love Not Distance, where she chronicles her life as the wife of a Marine). And during a long talk about our husbands, our careers (or lack thereof), our finances (or lack thereof), and our futures…we started talking about that phenomenon of the mid-twenties.

“It’s like we’re in-between the big things,” I said. I mean, we’re not in college anymore. We’re “off the market” romantically. But we’re not parents or home-owners, yet. We haven’t reached any occupational apexes, so to speak. I feel like I’m in a constant state of almost arriving. Or departing. Or something.

Like I’ve hopped off one train and am waiting for another. Is it late? Am I early?

Source: swingfashionista.com via Kyle on Pinterest

I think waiting is pretty exciting, too. I kind of like imagining all the amazing things the coming years have in store. But every now and then, I still tap my foot with impatience.

The theatre-major in me says I shouldn’t just be tapping my foot, though. I should be TAP-DANCING on this train platform, RELISHING this time, this place.

Source: thealternativebride.blogspot.com via Kyle on Pinterest

 

You know what? I’m kind of loving in-between land.

What about you? Where are you living these days?

love, elizabeth

PS: Croquet and bookstores and cupcakes…tune in tomorrow…