La Vie Est Belle 2015: Inspiration for the Year to Come

A New Year is such a delicious thing. Old years (while full of blessings, joy, and delight) are full of pain, mistakes, past-darkness, and fears. Not that the bad outweighs the good. At this time last year, I was unpublished, unemployed, and wondering what on earth I meant to do for money. Exactly twelve months later, I am well-established as a nanny, have two novels independently published, a novella more or less traditionally published, and a children's book ready to make the rounds. I went to Romania and came back, I traveled to work two summer camps, my best friend and best big brother got married, I had a whirlwind 24-hour jaunt to DC to see my other best friend after 2 1/2 years apart, and I fulfilled a long-held dream of acting as Stylist for a client or two. Another close friend got married, so many became engaged, babies were born everywhere, and God has continued to provide for our needs in miraculous ways.  So while twenty-fourteen was a hugely happy year full of new paths, new accomplishments, new jobs and relationships and lessons and faithfulness, I am also conscious that it was a year of turmoil for many people. I think of the unrest in Russia and Ukraine, Syria, Israel, the riots and mobs over racial matters in our country, the terror of ISIS and the many sadistic crimes it has committed...I think of several people who will not be living 2015 and the empty spaces they leave in the lives of their families and friends. Twenty-fourteen was a BIG year. For me, it was a good year. But I am tired of those twelve-months. Tired in a way I have seldom been tired before. It's funny how finishing with your tail whipped in a marathon and finishing triumphant feel nearly the same: you're still winded and breathless and ready to rest. It's time to bury 2014 in the gentle, winter snow (which has yet to appear) and to look forward with joyful anticipation to the fresh year ahead and all God intends to do in my life for His glory in it.

I have goals marked out for 2015, but enough about that in a different post. For now, I will give you the gift some of the beautiful images that have begun to serve as inspiration for this infant year due any day now. I have let myself wander through Pinterest in my Christmas break, pulling from here and there images that inspire me creatively, stylistically, spiritually, and practically. The funny thing about nearly every one of these pictures is its simplicity. I think I'm craving a rest from the craziness that was 2014. So funny how your subconscious tells on you! One of my main goals for 2015 is "Less of okay, more of excellent," in many many aspects of life. Including the things I allow to crowd my life. The simplifying begins with a series of photos I have given myself time to enjoy:

What is your gift to yourself before 2015 starts?

(you can find these images and more on my "Essentially Rachel" board)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Mini-London: a 24-hour course in Best-Friending

Those of you who have been around this blog longer than I care to remember (for posts were not in those days what they are today) might have lived through the days of my Georgia Campaign. On that campaign, I met my "crazy single friend," Katie Frost. Only back then, of course, she was not my best friend. In the two and a half years since Georgia, though, we have grown to be the best of the best sort of friends. Katie is my mainstay and I am hers. She has inspired me in so many ways though our lives run exactly opposite direction most of the time. I'm a nanny, novelist, and blogger while Katie runs statewide campaigns and hobnobs with the rich and famous. She was the main inspiration behind the Cinderella-figure in my contest-winning novella, The Windy Side of Care. In short, Katie's amazing. Which means that when we discovered her family had planned a trip to Washington D.C., it was imperative that I come.

It was the twenty-four-hour trip of a lifetime. We stayed at the Willard Inter-Continental with her family, met oodles of congressmen, pretended we were rich and chic, ran from the Library of Congress to the Rayburn building in high-heels, watched the Government Shutdown vote (and numerous congressmen of interest) from the balcony, rode the little train that is strictly Members Only (with a Member) from Rayburn to the Capitol, went on the Speaker's Balcony and through No Trespassing places, ordered hot cocoa from Room Service at 2 AM, and generally acted as if we were Eloise of the Plaza. A few pictures from the thingamajig:

stalker shot like a pro

Mini-Katie and I on the Speakers' Balcony. DC behind us. Best vantage-point ever.

Lady Alis in the flesh

 

See that tam? It is somewhere on the White House lawn.

The Hill was WINDY the entire time, except for the magical half-hour in which snow fell just for us.

 

Poor lighting, but we had to get a picture on the Congressmen-only train!

 If you ever get a chance to step into the Willard at Christmas, do so. It is beautiful beyond imagining. I was there for under 24 hours and had enough plot material for a novella which I am executing in 12 parts on my other blog. I'm not sure what a week would do for me.

ain't nobody got time for more than some iPhone shots

The Frosts are so involved in politics that they know pretty nearly everyone. Only a slight exaggeration. Though I have been to DC numerous times, I had not gone in the company of a Congressman, which made this a special trip. We saw many lovely hidden places such as the chapel where the Congressmen go to pray. Actually had to wait for one to leave before we could go in. I'm blessed to have been considered an honorary Georgian and a temporary Frost! :D

How beautiful is the Willard, even in a blurry phone photo?

There is one picture that Katie and I snapped of ourselves at 3 AM that night...after hot showers and hot cocoa and getting all the little girls changed and bathed and in bed...and trying to begin watching Decoy Bride. But lest Katie ever marry a famous person and the press comes looking for blackmail photos, I'll refrain. Aren't I a good best friend? Suffice it to say, we looked dreadful.

There was good food, lots of waiting in hallways, crowded Uber (sp?) rides and a hurried, breathless, not-wanting-to-think-it-was-true goodbye at the metro stop where I then ferried myself to the end of the line and was picked up (after some confusion) by my sister-in-law. So many beautiful moments in that too-short piece of wonderful, but my favorite memory has to be the moment of meeting after our terribly long absence. It was exactly like in a movie. I saw Katie in the hall on the far side of the marble plaza, calmly handed off my gloves and purse and we caught each other in a huge hug that was so obviously long-awaited that the hostess grinned. And she's probably used to seeing meetings.

Oh DC, you were beautiful. Next time Charleston. Then London. <3

Long-distance friendships? Yeah they're rough, but being together again is so worth the wait.

My Ragamuffin Heart

The sun is sifting down below the up-thrust of pines across the cotton field. Silver clouds stretch greyhound-shaped across a pure blue sky, trying to outstrip the dusk that will overtake them with a Midas touch and spin them into gold threads. I have spent the afternoon reading aloud a good novel to my younger sister while she practices drawing portraits. My seven year old sister, Grace, was baptized today with ten others. After church, my cousin and I went out to lunch--the cousin I scarcely see anymore, since we both took up the professional life. He paid, though he knew I didn't expect it. For dinner this evening, we have leftovers from Dad's birthday: the most delicious sort of leftovers. My trench-coat smells of adventure, or maybe it is only last night's bonfire.My sisters and I have saved our portion to eat at another bonfire tonight: sourdough bread toasted over open flames, pork tenderloin crisped over a wood fire. Perhaps my cousin will come over. Perhaps we'll have one of the Good Old Times. It's cold tonight and October is reckoning. Yesterday, I saw one of my girlhood friends and her new, velvet baby. In three short weeks my beloved older brother is marrying my best friend.

Grace abounds; overflows; caresses; shouts.

But am I content?

I wish I could say yes, without telling a lie. I am thankful for all these blessings--recounting them now, I am ashamed at the discontentment blotting this beautiful, autumn page. But if I am going to be entirely honest--and how am I to be credible if don't?--than I have to tell you that my heart is weak tonight. Tonight, my heart looks at all this and thinks, "Yes, it's very nice, but it's not what I want most." What do I want most? I hesitate to ask myself this question because I know my answer and I know the right answer, and they're not the same. Not tonight.

Tonight, what my heart wants most is a husband.

There. I said it. Be shocked if you want, or agree with me. Tell me that isn't where I will find my fulfillment. I know this. I know this deeper than deep down in my soul. But for all the knowing, it doesn't mean that I don't want it. And the reason I want it so badly, is this: my heart doubts He can do it. My heart doubts that God can overcome the details of my desires vs. current realities. My heart doubts. I've finally said it. I laugh, like Sarah, at the idea that God could do it. I tally up on burned fingers the number of ways in which I'm not good enough, pretty enough, clever enough, talented enough, attractive enough, busy enough, traveled enough, holy enough to even come close to thinking there's a chance I'll win the heart of any man, if I knew of a man whose heart I wanted to win. It isn't easy to write this here for all of you to see. I would much rather put a brave face on, be the sensible woman I usually am, and say I'm perfectly content with my admittedly beautiful life. Tonight, that's not where my heart is.

But there's this thing about hearts, a secret I learned by rote a long time ago. A secret whose import I haven't bothered to understand until now. Now I think I understand what it really means. Funny, how seven words can change from meaningless to meaning so much in an unholy moment, made holy by the revelation. "The heart is deceitful above all things." Deceitful. Lying. Cheating. Unfair. Dishonest. My heart is all these things. Tonight, my heart tells me that God can't do it. GOD. The same God who made this entire universe, who, this March, turned an unsuspecting me from unemployed to having a precious job, who has acted like the best sort of romantic and caused two of my favorite people to fall in love with each other, who has given me the gift of having a house in a quiet corner of the country where I can see the sunrises and sunsets each day and the stars like crystal-shards at night. God can't do it. Or He won't. Or can't and won't. God isn't going to do it, my heart says. It thinks it is right.

My head knows this isn't true. My head hardly ever wavers from a circumspect course. But heads can't feel and hearts can. They can hurt like hell. Hearts can throw back their heads and howl and blur away the blessing from the moments, steal the breath, beat the temples with an almost physical blow. Hearts can speak louder than any thought, and their words are poison. A head, in this situation is useless. My soul is another matter. It is quiet tonight. So quiet, I almost worry I have killed it in my perversity of spirit. Thank God that's theologically impossible. "What's up, Soul?" I wonder. "Can't you crush my heart with some grand dose of spiritual common sense? My head's on your side, but my heart's over here standing on a chair with his head thrown back, shrilling. My ears hurt. My body hurts. My heart hurts."
Still, my soul is quiet. It's a little unnerving. I go out to the front porch to breathe in the sunset, breathe out the poison, breathe in the chill air, breathe out the doubt and pain. I bring my heart, kicking, screaming, digging its fingernails like bloody half-moons into the tops of my hands. "God," I whisper. "I'm sorry. I'm sorry that I my heart doesn't believe you. I need you to take this and show me how to quieten it. Show me how to believe again. I am so sorry."
And then my soul lumbers to its feet at last--I feel relieved, as if I really had killed it--and puts a heavy, clumsy hand on my heart. Heart, fitful, fretful, fractious child that it is, kicks a little. Screams once or twice. Bites the hand. But the hand is calloused in the best way, accustomed to the throbbing of my deceived heart. My soul remembers, suddenly, the set of words that have fed me this weekend:

How precious is your lovingkindness,

O God!

Therefore the children of men put their trust under the shadow of Your wings.

They are abundantly satisfied with the fullness of Your house,

And You give them drink from the river of Your pleasures.

For with You is the fountain of life.

In Your light we see light.

(Psalm 36:7-8)

The clouds like greyhounds have given tongue to the dark and fall in a heap of golden glory. A long slide of silver light reaches toward where I sit on the cold bricks. My heart is still yelling like an infant, but the tantrum feels strangely futile because of my soul's hand. I taste the words of the Psalmist, say them aloud, bring the promise to my God. I have put my trust under the shadow of His wings, whatever my heart tells me to the contrary. He has promised that I will be satisfied with the fullness of His house, that I will drink from the river of His pleasures, that His fountain is life. He will keep His promises. This I know with the full fury of my soul.
Why, then, won't my heart feel it too?
Why does my heart persist in its shameful refusal to believe?
Then I realize why. Because it has withdrawn into a dark corner, wrapped a blanket of dishonesty about its shoulders. This time, the dishonesty is the very secret I just spilled: that my heart doesn't believe. In the darkness, it can't believe. It can't possibly see the light, because the only way in which it can is through the light of the one it has chosen tonight to distrust. As I whisper these words and force my heart to stand in the truth of the promise, I feel the silver of that sky slide into my soul and shore up its faith. My ears are ringing, and I realize it isn't from an increased pitch of my shrieking heart...actually, my heart is muffled by something strange: a flood of joy. It rushes and foams with the voice of many waters and I can barely hear my heart under the sound. If I look for that ridiculous, lying heart, I know it is still hammering its fallacies, trying to work its way to my steadfast soul. But my soul has been fed by the light, both figuratively and literally. My soul is in fighting trim. It feels like laughing. And just to annoy my ragamuffin heart, he leaves his hand there, just a little longer.

"When my heart is overwhelmed, lead me to the Rock that is higher than I."

Saturday Style: Navvy Boots

Hello, peoples all! It has been far too long since I've had a spare hour to photograph my clothing. I promise I do wear clothes, even when you don't see them on here. XD Also, I am feeling increasingly vexed with iPhone mirror selfies for these posts. Hopefully I can get an actual camera on duty soon (and an assistant to photograph me). For now, though, no sense in being a crosspatch and not posting for the silly reason of poor photo-quality.

Today, I have three fun components to my nautical-themed outfit: a striped crop-top with latticed back (not pictured), turquoise belt, and high-heeled knee boots. I am so excited about the boots. I bought them to wear in my brother's outdoor wedding in November...I have wanted boots for so long, but being a curvy-girl, most tall boots don't fit over my calf. Enter Kohl's and a pair of boots created especially for women like me. They are so comfortable, so stylish, and so fun to add to an outfit. So yes: the boots. I like them.

People say you can't mix brown and black very easily, but I believe you can...you just have to get the right mixture of other colors in the combo. I didn't want to do the red & blue nautical thing today. Instead, I chose to bring out another level of blue for a somewhat playful feel to the thing to counteract the serious Parisness of the boots. ;)

Light flares because it's sunning like crazy over here.

Virginia Octobers are beautiful and cool, but not so cool you actually need a coat. Enter useful things like lightweight, long-sleeve tops and boots. I used to dislike tucked in tops because I don't have a tiny waist, but I am growing to love the look of being able to show off a sweet belt or cute top. I have definitely been inspired to try new things by curvy fashion bloggers such as Girl With Curves. Following a few of them on Instagram gives me a fashion boost each day. (Did you know I'm on Instagram?) Knowing that certain styles can either look chic or sloppy encourages me to be mindful of my posture, and they really can look great when I remember. ;) I chose to put a tangerine-colored cami under this crop-top in case it decided to rise up. Been thinking it would be useful to do a post sometime on how to modestly style a crop-top...would you guys be interested?

As you can see, the shirt won't always stay put and it's nice to know my belly isn't showing. Otherwise someone might start calling me Winnie-the-Pooh, and much as I adore him, that isn't exactly what I'm going for. XD

What are you wearing this bright October Saturday? Do you have any plans? I'm for a morning of book-release work (Anon, Sir, Anon comes out the Fifth of November! Add it to your Goodreads list if you love me), then a baby-shower this afternoon. Wanna guess what I'm giving the wee lad? (Hint: it starts with "winnie" and ends with "thepooh." ;) Cheers!

To The Girl Who Has Three Lives

Dear Girl Who Has Three Lives:
     (or more):
      I know how you feel.
There's the You who works in the coffee shop or the church office or goes to college or the You who stands in her first semester as a teacher with twenty kids who are calling her "Miss So-and-So" and expecting she'll actually teach them stuff about life. Or, if you're like me, there's the You who spends the majority of the week taking care of, playing with, and teaching two precious little girls whose boundless curiosity and ceaseless energy shows you what your Mom has been doing since the birth of your older brother (times four).
There's the You who comes home tired from that other You and wants peace and quiet and a harmonious family. But there is dinner to be made and chores to keep up with and the harmonious family has gone off-key for an hour or two and life is crazy. This was the first You, and is known so well that it fits like a groove, despite its eccentricities. This You has an amazing family that misses her and she misses them and the disjointedness of lives trying to click back together while spinning in hyper-speed--your days off coinciding with their days away--and it's tough to steal moments of normalcy. But this version of You craves those moments and sometimes wonders what it would be like to return to the time when it was the only You and there was time to hang up your clothes and bother to put the bobby-pins back in their dish and that stack of To-Be-Read books was actually diminishing at a discernable pace.
Then, of course, there's the You of dreams. There's the You who, while steaming that milk, folding those invoices, making those calls, or teaching those math lessons, keeps up a secret life behind the scenes of hopes and dreams and long-term goals. For me, that's my writing. A thousand words typed at an unholy hour because every sensible, conscionable minute of normal-people is taken up by those other two Mes. This You might be pursuing music, art, publication, photography, a business, or something else. This You is usually the one who falls, by default, into disrepair because it is the more quiet You. It is sometimes shy and always willing to bend to reality. Dreams can be pushed off, tabled, quietened. This You isn't really all that perishable and if you close down the Word document for three months, the repercussions aren't what they would be if you stopped showing up to work for the same period of time or shut off communication with those dearest to you.

For each of these Yous, You could justifiably devote a whole life, in theory. But theories bend to achievement and everyone realizes we can't claim seventy-two hours for a day in which to be all three. And yet, Girl, you are trying to be all three. I am trying to be all three. Is it wrong? Is it crazy? Should you give up the dreams or the job or the family?

No.

It's not wrong, it's only a little crazy, and you should definitely not give up your dreams, your family, and the job God has placed you in (unless He shows you otherwise). One life crammed into one's head is enough to make most people overwhelmed. But to those of use who are juggling three, how can we keep sane?

I've been thinking. I am barely home these days between one thing and another and weddings. On any given Saturday, my room is covered with cast off clothing that I was too tired to put away after coming home from a fifteen-hour day. My bobby-pins never make it into the dish. I wear jeans when the weather is eighty-five because I really couldn't spare the extra eight minutes to shave my legs and heaven forbid I get in the shower and find no shampoo because when you're showering at 6:30 a.m., there's no one awake to fetch it for you. So I've been giving more thought than usual to how the Three-Lived-Girl can keep sane and it comes down to Jim Eliot:

"Wherever you are, be all there."

When you're at work, be entirely at work. When you're at home, be entirely at home. When you're working on that painting, that story, that song, that product, be one-hundred-percent there in that moment. For me, that means shutting off my 3G data on my phone at work, leaving texts till a more convenient hour when I'm blogging or writing, or lesson-planning, and leaving my phone upstairs when I'm around the house. I love technology and social media has blessed me with a covey of friends I would otherwise have never met. But technology is deceptive in that it convinces you that things have to be done RIGHT NOW. And the girl already living three lives can't afford to have them bleed into one another. If I am trying to teach math concepts to a three year-old and answer a five year  old's questions about how Indians killed buffalo and answer a Facebook message about wedding plans and reply to a comment on a blog and to text the recipe I made up for fish tacos to the sister who is making dinner because I can't be home to help because I'm headed an hour into the city to go a bible-study and I'm trying to do it ALL AT ONCE, I will crumble. I don't know about you, but I can feel it crumble. I can feel my resolve weakening, my heart becoming downcast, and my soul overwhelmed. I decided to try Jim Eliot's theory out last week and give myself completely to the tasks at hand one at a time. What I found was a sense of joy in accomplishing that one task instead of angst over the twenty-seven others left to be done. Yes, there were still twenty-seven tasks, but one can meet a single foe on level ground far easier than being dog-piled by an entire company.

Wherever you are, Girl With Three Lives, be all there. In the mornings, give one hundred percent of your attention to Jesus and focus your eyes on Him from the start. At work, give full attention to the joy of building into the lives around you. When you're home, leave the virtual world connected to a charger and play a game of Scrabble or watch an old Disney film together. When you're pursuing dreams, friends, or long-cherished goals, give it your all.

That's how we keep all the balls in the air. Focus.

Pretty Mail

If you were anything like me as a kid, you would have had at least ten pen-pals over the years and lost just about as many through neglect, forgetting to send the letters your wrote, or just getting bored of the duty of writing back. As we learned to use the computer and the internet got more advanced and we learned how to type, writing letters dropped away almost completely. But you know me. I'm stubborn as anything and won't entirely let go of things I love. And I dearly love giving and receiving snail-mail. I have this passion for outwitting the post office. Doesn't that sound terrible? But seriously. I just weigh packages in my hand, slap stamps on, and stuff them in the mailbox. They always get to their destinations. Recently, I sent a copy of my book to a friend in Romania. I put five or six stamps on it, shoved it in the mail, and a week and a half later, it was in her hands. Now, if I'd gone into the post office and asked them what they wanted to charge me, that package would have cost something terribly like fifteen bucks.

All post-office regulations aside, sending and receiving mail the good old way will never go out of style. Who doesn't like getting a piece of mail? And furthermore, who doesn't like getting a piece of mail that is as much a delight to look at as it will be to read? Since I have three or four letters to respond to this weekend, I spent a little while on Pinterest last night browsing unique ways to address letters. Here are some of my favorites. May they serve as inspiration to you to send a surprise someone's way. <3

"Hi, I'm Single and I Have Blisters."

Most days I am quite content in the fact that it may be a longgggggggggg time till I get married. Mama always looks at me with mock severity and says, "You have no idea how quickly things can change." She's always right, but that doesn't mean I'm hedging any bets. I have a full life here without a fella. I mean, between work, my family, and my writing (yes, it is a thing that intentionally distracts me from self-pity) would I even have time for a relationship? Can't get much better than painting my toenails blue and watching Once Upon a Time with my sisters, can it?

This is my "Yayyyyy Daddddddd" face.

Not that I'd really know...

Some days it just kind of hits me. Know the sort? The fact that no man in my age-group has ever told me he thinks I'm something pretty awesome, that he wants to get to know me better, that I'm the person he looks for when he walks into a room, that I'm the girl he's been praying for. Whenever I have days like this, I'm hesitant to verbally recognize the yearning because I don't want to set off a stream of, "It's okay, you'll find a guy someday. Just wait patiently on the Lord. He is faithful."
Of course He's faithful. Of course I'll (probably) find a guy someday. But no one said that the boots aren't going to pinch now and then.

Yes, sometimes it gets annoying. Case in point: two more friends got engaged this week. I barely see my cousin anymore because he's got a girlfriend and a new job and chill-time doesn't happen. No conversation goes on at home without turning to someone's wedding plans. Sometimes the Love Bug victim-count seems like it's hacking up there with the Black Plague and I start wondering who slipped the Thieve's Oil into my pocket because honestly, they can have it back. I wouldn't mind catching that plague. If falling in love is sabotage, then I have a death-wish.

I've gotten to the point where I laugh on these days and message my equally-single best friend and together we compare notes about how fabulous we are. Chocolate is good too. I know this feeling of utter....futility isn't going to last. Handsome men will be toads from now till kingdom-come, tiny blondes will probably still rank top on the list of Quickly Married Women, and athletic, rugged, cowboy types will probably still want a wife who will go running (or barrel-racing) with him for the next forevermore. I'll still rumble along cheerily as ever, I'll enjoy my job, enjoy my family, and enjoy playing bridesmaid, florist, hairstylist, cake-decorator, and event coordinator for the friends who are getting married. I'll have adventures and love life and meet people and go to social functions and be me. That's how life is.

And it's good. But life can hurt and I guess what I'm here to say tonight is this: it's okay.

Girls: It's okay that there's an ache under your breastbone and an incapacity to look at another wedding picture in your Pinterest feed. It's okay that you feel like punching the handsome-acquaintance-who-drinks-and-smokes (as your just found out) across his perfect nose. It's okay that you feel like sitting down with a tub of gelato and eating it--all of it--with your best friend or a sister while wishing for a saved, sanctified Captain Hook. It's okay that you let fly a snide remark about the eighteenth saccharine Facebook post in a week from that happily almost-wedded couple. Besides--sugar isn't good for you.

Family: It's okay that we are having a rough day. It's not that we think we'll never get married. We don't think God has left us in the ditch. We don't think we're going to be spinsters, we don't intend to join a dating website ASAP, we don't intend to fall into deep depression, start wearing sweat pants constantly, and adopt another cat. We're very simply getting a blister from walking this far down the road of singleness. We know our lives are precious, that there is adventure around every bend, and that we are blessed.

So people, let's have grace. Grace with ourselves, our families, and each other. Grace for the God who is leading us on this road that can seem as empty as the Oklahoma sky. It sounds weird to say we need grace for God, because the only grace we have comes through Him. But part of owning grace is acting upon it, and believing with grace that what He says is true takes real courage and doesn't come easily, some days.

I'm single. Tonight it stinks. Tomorrow it'll be a blessing. That's how it goes with singleness as with every other topsy-turvy stage in life. I am so blessed that Jesus has the map to this weird road. I think I'd be tempted to look for a short-cut.