The Secret Life of Optimists

Okay, show of hands: how many people here have seen The Secret Life of Walter Mitty (2013)? I have several friends who hate it, several who adore it, and several who look at me with confused but polite expressions on their faces when I ask if they've seen it.

On a basic level, Walter Mitty is a film about a hard-core day-dreamer in love with a girl at work he's never spoken to, who finds himself saddled with discovering the baffling whereabouts of a vital photograph ("Quintessence") missing from his workplace. We all like to pull for the underdog, especially one with a heart and imagination as endearing as Walter's. But at its core, the film is a celebration of imagination, optimism, friendship, art, adventure...all the things that make up the delightful parts of life.Walter Mitty works at Life Magazine and the company's motto will always inspire me:

"To see the world,
Things dangerous to come to,
To see behind walls,
Draw closer,
To find each other,
And to feel.
That is the purpose of life."

 I suppose the reason I love The Secret Life of Walter Mitty (apart from the stunning and artistic way the film was shot) is because it is a story about a person like me. A person with an imagination that colors his world brighter than usual. A person who has more than once spaced out in a conversation, totally enveloped in What Could Happen. A person who sees possibility everywhere, in everyone. A person who has within his mind, a million outcomes of a million situations and is poised just so, waiting to see which will really come to pass and where it might take him.

This first week of 2015 has been amazing. I am not exactly sure why except that I have lived every day with this glorious sensation of Just Around the River Bend practically sparking out of me. 2015 is, so far, an open year. I don't have many plans. Those I do have are just sketches, waiting to be filled with color by the adventures God lets me stumble across. Exciting things are lurking in the corners. I just know it. I don't have a reason for knowing it, but somehow I do. Seriously, put away your raised eyebrows. There are no secrets here. Just a flush on my cheeks and my heart beating a little smidgen faster than usual because something is coming. The unknown is all around me and there's something in the wind that makes me so terribly excited for this year. And yet, I feel a little like Jane and Michael Banks after Bert has done his rigmarole of: "You think...you...wink, you do a double-blink, you close your eyes and...."

Jane cocks her head, looks at Bert and says:

 "Is something s'posed to happen?"

That's how I feel right now. Is something s'posed to happen? Will it? I have my eye on several situations in friends' lives that could bloom into straight-up, real time fairy-tales or epic-saga adventures. I'm waiting for the next part of the story, conscious that any moment could catapult them (and me, vicariously) into a crazy, practically unheard-of new world. In my own life, things move along as usual. I spend my days doing life in technicolor. The people at the grocery-store are not just people. I mean, they are just people but not just people. I believe in the rich old truth that my life is a story and each component is part of that tale. Therefore, the man behind me in line at the grocery store could turn out to be important. The lady who cuts in front of me in traffic. The bank teller I saw twice in one day. The man in the window of the National Press Club Building. The woman whose package I rescued off the metro who I finally got back in contact with. My brain goes wild with the possibilities. When those people don't give me something memorable, I remedy the situation by doing something creative for them to remember. If I can't meet That Person, I'll be That Person. Call it what you will (fate, destiny, a horse), there's never a dull moment in this brain. I know bad stuff happens in life, but I know good stuff happens too, and it's the good stuff, the grace-moments in life that I wait for. They're there. They're everywhere. Some people just don't look for them or notice.

But living this secret life of brilliant hues has a flip-side: when life does turn out to be normal and the threads running across it seem to be weaving an average graham-colored bit of the tapestry, the heart-racing, flush-cheeked, eyes-sparkling existence begins to feel like a pacing tiger in a cage. I'm ready for the adventure. Where is it? I'm keeping a weather eye out for the next interesting person, the next impossibly beautiful moonrise, the next rose-red leaf silvered with frost, the next place to send an anonymous letter, the next way to secretly give a quiet blessing. It's an odd sort of discontentment, waiting for the peacock blues and currant reds and new-wheat greens in the tapestry of life to cover the graham-colors. When they don't come on their own, I make them myself, content in mixing dyes from the bits of everyday magic around me. I'm content with waiting, with letting wild hopes fly through my fingers each day, for there are always more hopes to be spent tomorrow. It's a luxury that optimists like myself can easily spare. But I will admit that our outlook can be exhausting,  for we spend hope at an extravagant rate and if it's a harsh master who would call it wasteful, our output is certainly tiring. I discussed this topic briefly with a friend this evening:

"Did you know it is slightly exhausting being an imaginative optimist? I mean, what's more tiring and frustrating: waiting for nothing to happen or waiting for anything to happen? In the first case you at least are fairly ready to stay where you are all your life. In the latter, you have the most delicious sense of 'any day now.'"

...or "any person now," or "any moment now," or "any page now," or "any conversation now," or "any query now." I don't believe the hope is poorly spent. I would always far rather be the optimist waiting with shining eyes and a laugh caught in her throat because anything could happen, than the pessimist who pulls on his tan trench-coat and trudges to work through snow whose beauty he can't even see because he can think of nothing but what a mess it'll make of the roads. I would always rather be That Person than a thousand Anyone Elses. I would always rather be a half-short, past-plump girl who makes generous messes in the kitchen than the tall, slender model who can't allow herself a slice of sourdough toast. I would always rather be the girl sleepy-eyed and smiling from an overdose of well-marked books than the frowning, tired-eyed girl who gave up reading because her schedule didn't allow it. I'd always rather wake up believing with my whole heart that impossible things can happen than going to bed each night satisfied that nothing did.

So let the tiger pace; it's striped and tawny and beautiful. Let people pass me by; they'll remember I smiled their direction. Let real photographers buy cameras; I just ask a small, friendly moment to capture the fragile beauties with my (now contentedly outdated) iPhone. Let real artists paint masterpieces; I just want my little, dusty watercolors and a brush not losing too many bristles.

Welcome to The Secret Life of Optimists, in Technicolor, 2015.

"Excuse me, sir, he is a Prince!"

Would you go with me if we rolled down streets a fire? Would you hold on to me tighter as the summer sun got higher? Oh, and would it be okay if I didn't know the way?

-Josh Turner

The fun part of life is that it never turns out how you think it will. Sometimes it is just a little scary in a "I think this is good for me but it isn't my hobbit-hole" way. In the past week, I've applied to be a part-time nanny (and will be interviewing early this week), Sarah heard that she was accepted for a summer internship for Generation Joshua (meaning she'll be living in Leesburg all summer), we got our own intern/apprentice for our landscape business, I committed to a rather complex out-of-town fundraiser for our Romania Missions Trip, and I saw an old friend get married to her sweet man. (And they had homemade soft pretzels there. SOFT PRETZELS. The way to my heart is through soft pretzels.) In between these things, I have been editing my next novel, running errands and working for Dad, and trying not to freak out about scheduling. Oh. And we're down to one car for the whole entire family. I'm trying not to panic about the fact that if I DO get this job, it means that I will be thrown into the world of I Have To Get To Work And I Have No Car. Ahem. But God kind of just placed this in my lap and Mama thought I should at least step into it and see what's what.

Because sourdough toast deserves a glory-moment

I told Abigail Taylor today that I have a funny strain in my character: I like adventure and I like new challenges. But I will step forward into something and then get paralyzed with fright while I'm waiting, realizing I left my safe shore and can't touch bottom anymore and I'm not even certain if the other shore will hold weight. I'm very hobbit-like that way. About this nanny-job, I told her: "What's the worst the woman can say, 'Yes'?" But I'm trusting that if God brought this about, He'll bring me through, and if it isn't the right thing right now, He'll cut off the opportunity. Still, it's stressing me a little bit. Sheesh. I mean, I love my cozy little rut of earning no money and being a writer and not having to worry about an employer outside my Dad...even though I've often thought it'd be fun to have some sort of job. 

Anyway, that's an odd little rant. If you think to pray for me, it would be much appreciated! I realize I've been a little spacey and vague on this blog. If you have any questions about particular aspects of my life that I have forgotten to address, do, please, ask me about them and I'll do my best to update you! I've been getting a bit of reading done. My nose is currently in Jenny Freitag's work and P.G. Wodehouse: A Life in Letters which is fascinating. I love reading authors' letters...a person's letters give such great insight into who that person was, and how they viewed themselves, their work, and the world around them. It's almost better than a journal, really.

Let's see what else I can think of....oh! I saw Divergent and really enjoyed it! In my opinion, it was better than the Hunger Games movies...more hopeful, somehow. And Triss is a more relatable character than Katniss, for me. I also watched Northanger Abbey for the first time last night and--apart from a couple minor things--it was fabulous. Henry Tilney is such a chump. <3 A man who would tease me like that with a smile like that and a heart like that....eeeeeesh. And if a guy ever quotes his line to me during a dance, my heart will be gone:

"You must allow me one smirk, then we can return to being rational again."

(Incidentally, the title-quote has nothing to do with this post.) 

On the brink of the 2013 Adventure

I'm not a big one for making New Year's resolutions. I am, however, a big one for starting afresh. I love New Year's because more than I like ushering out the old year, I love welcoming the fresh one in. I love a new date to write on letters. I love the prospect of a whole twelve-month ahead of me that is unmarked and untouched and full of possibility. I think the future is one of those things that is best and brightest when ahead. Which sounds like an oxymoron because of course the future is "ahead". Just bear with me, okay? I have my little idiosyncracies like everyone else. ;) For me, there is a lovely lovely thought that there is something to come. Something I haven't discovered yet. A surprise, an adventure, and a twist in the road.

Honestly. I entered 2012 expecting the year to be much like the one before. After all, I could see absolutely nothing ahead of me that I hadn't expected. And then, much like a little rafter pushing down the river and suddenly encountering rapids, the year swept me up and off and I've only just poked my head above the waters to look around and see how far we've come.

Some of the big things this year? 

I went to a girls' retreat

I helped out with a wedding.

I arranged a successful match. ;)

I went to see the touring Broadway production of Wicked.

I went to Georgia for an entire month and met dozens of new friends.

 I started finished The Scarlet-Gypsy Song and edited it.

I wrote Fly Away Home and edited it.

I sent out query letters and got a response for A Mother for the Seasonings.

I had my "Golden Birthday"

I bought my laptop

I started to write for Meditations of His Love and met even more friends.

I got a Girlfriend-in-Law who was formerly (and still is) my best friend, and is now my brother's best friend as well. <3

I read the unabridged Les Miserables.

I went to a Jars of Clay concert.

I went to a Building 429 concert.

I did my first product review for eShakti.

I counseled at a camp.

I was a cat-herder for the Generation Joshua Student Action Teams (SAT)

I helped throw a double-graduation for Sarah and Matthew.

I received a Samsung Galaxy Tablet.

I caved and downloaded an e-book.

I got my license.

I went to the midnight premier of The Hobbit.

I saw Les Miserables.

What has happened in your life this year? Are you ready for the 2013 adventure?

this daring life

What if it wasn't about getting married?

What if it wasn't about waiting?

What if it wasn't about Till Then or Someday?

What if it was simply about embracing life in a bear-hug, hanging on with all you've got, and loving where you'd been placed?

These are questions that have surfaced and resurfaced in my mind and heart this past year as I've watched so many of my friends grow up, marry, pair off, and change. Those of us who aren't paired up with someone tend to think of ourselves as shelf-stock. When asked if we've got a guy we shake our heads, laugh patiently, and say: "Well, not yet."

But I'm sick of living in "yet."

We're all sick of living in "yet." It's as if we feel that our lives and our futures and everything we are is on hold till...then. If I am certain of one thing, it is that God does not mean for singleness to be a purgatory. I've said before that this isn't an endurance test. It's not a desert to go through till we reach the oasis of marriage on the other side. What if singleness is the oasis? What if we laid aside all our expectations of how our grown-up years ought to look and instead dwelt in the moment? In this moment.

Too often we Christian "singles" are in either of two camps:

Pining or Pinging

Pining for a husband (or wife, as the case may be), for the future we want, for something.
Pinging. Pinging off the walls with feministic (or arrogant) energy and self-reliance. With our own plans for our own future because obviously God doesn't have marriage in His plan for us--MOVING ON!

It's my firm belief that there is a joyful, vibrant middle-ground that Jesus has prepared for us and is waiting for us to find. After all, Paul of the Bible is full of praise for the single life. He even goes so far as to say that he wishes more people remained unmarried because--in his personal opinion--it was the better thing. Obviously he was not sitting there wailing for a wife.

So what is this middle ground? I'm not certain of all the details, but I am certain that it is there. It's a radical, daring idea....living your single years without looking for the "light at the end of the tunnel." I don't know how to do it yet. But I feel God moving in my heart in this way and it's terribly exciting. Daring. Adventurous. If I ever am to marry, I want to look back on this season of unmarried-ness without a single regret. I want to remember it as one of the finest parts of my life. I want to look back on it with fondness when I'm eighty-four and a widow.
After talking to many friends who are in this same season of life and waking up to the reality of this paradox of Pining or Pinging, I am curious and expectant. There's obviously something here. Something God is wanting to teach me, perhaps you, perhaps many unmarried young people around the world. So since I've sat up and taken notice, I've decided to keep track of the things the Lord shows me in this season. I'm writing them down in a rather schnazzy, bling-spangled journal to keep forever and always.

 I'm writing these lessons down as they come with the intention of sharing them with you. That is, if you'd like to hear them. Anyway, hold fast, dear people! This is a joyous, beautiful time of our lives! Don't fret it away. :) Enjoy this daring life while it has been given to you.