Beauty on the Backroads

Stories of grace for life's unexpected turns

Lisa

A new course for 2019

A few weeks ago, I was sure my word for 2019 would be “listen.” But then a friend asked a question directed toward a group of writers about what we wanted for our writing in the new year, and instead of an instant reply, I took some time to think about it.

A word settled in.

Intention.

I want my writing to be less haphazard, more purposeful in the coming year. I want to write what I want to write and be more consistent about writing. I want to finish the projects I start. I want to keep making time for my writing, and I want to be less afraid to keep it to myself. (Especially the fiction.) If I want to achieve certain goals with my writing, I have to make an effort toward those goals. No one is going to hand me my dreams on a silver platter and beg me to take them. I will have to do some work.

The more I thought about this word–intention/intentional–the more it made sense for my year as a whole. With the year that just passed being one where I took more control and made better choices for health and wellness, where I didn’t for the first time feel carried along by whatever current we found ourselves in, looking ahead to 2019 makes me want to keep making conscious choices about our life. 

I want my life to be about the things I want it to be about. I want to remember the power of saying no to things that don’t fit with my goals. And I don’t want to say yes to something just because it seems like a good thing to do.

This word has already been active, before the year even started.

While we were home for Christmas, I was offered (and accepted) the role of chief Christmas cookie baker for our family. For as long as I can remember, my grandmother has been making large batches of cut-out sugar cookies for Christmas and other holidays. These are generally the only sugar cookies I will eat, and most everyone in the family looks forward to them each year. My cousin even gets a batch shaped like Pac-Man for his birthday. (Round cookie with a small triangle cut out and a chocolate chip for the eye. A huge hit with most of us who experienced the 1980s.)

This year, Grandma decided she’s done making the cookies. It is a rigorous process and what used to be a family effort isn’t anymore. I blame myself not living in the same state as my grandmother. Others in the family have tried to make these cookies and they don’t always turn out right. I once said that I would take the reins when it was time because I have had some success with the cookie recipe. My daughter is also on board. Apparently, we have what it takes to take this on. We’ll see.

Valentine’s cookies from several years ago

It’s been a little while since I’ve made these cookies. I have all year to practice. If you live nearby, you might find yourself gifted with practice sugar cookies. You can thank me later.

Christmas cookies for the family is not something I can do on a whim or without preparation or at the last minute. It will require intention–which to me means setting aside time to bake and figuring out how to send dozens of cookies cross country during the holidays. (And do I decorate them before or after I mail them? Hmm…)

I can’t adopt this put-it-off-till-the-last-minute or “I’ll do it someday” attitude with other parts of my life, either. I have to make sure that my intentions don’t just stay as “happy thoughts.” Intention is a word that gets thrown around a lot and doesn’t always have substance behind it, and I don’t want to be just another person with intention and no action. This is not about a buzzword or fad. 

My intentions must be followed by actions. And while my OneWord always surprises me, in this case, I think it would be good to have at least an outline of a plan.

Photo by Felipe Furtado on Unsplash

So, here are some of my “intentional” resolutions, if you will:

  1. Better and more frequent communication with family and friends. I rely on Facebook too much for disseminating the details of my life. The thing is, lots of people don’t see Facebook posts or even use it that much anymore. (According to my students, Facebook is for old people, so now you know.) And I’m desperate for depth when it comes to catching up with the important people in my life. Already, I’ve had a video phone call with my oldest friend that was so life-giving and much too short that we’ve made plans to talk again next month. She and I did not talk via the phone at all last year, and when her Christmas letter came, I realized how much I missed her. Living 800 miles from family makes keeping in touch a challenge, especially with school/work/sleep schedules, but technology makes keeping in touch not impossible.
  2. Immediate action. Related to the previous goal, I don’t want my intentions to be just intentions. Too often I have good intentions that never translate into action because I put off whatever it is I think is a good idea. Sometimes, it’s good to take immediate action when I think of someone I want to talk to or something I want to do for someone else. Even before the new year ticked over to 2019, I did this with a college friend. Instead of saying “we should get together when I’m home,” I offered up our availability and we made it work. I too easily talk myself out of making plans because they require work. (This literally required an hour-long drive and restaurant research. Sooooo hard. Not.) I’m trying to do better at responding sooner than later or reaching out when the first thought of a person comes to mind. No more “I’ll get to that later.”
  3. Get-togethers in our house. Phil and I love getting people together and we have used our house as an excuse not to. We took some steps toward that this year but want to expand on it this year. We don’t have to wait for a special occasion to have people over, or a holiday. We’re already thinking about events, though, like the Super Bowl. And making sure we follow up with people who say things like “We should get together soon.” Our most recent date night resulted from such a follow-up.
  4. Vacation. Yes, it’s only January, but summer is our prime time for family togetherness, so we’re already talking about what our vacation for this year might be, and it will require planning. (My husband has already ordered some vacation planning materials from the places we are thinking about visiting.) I think planning and intention go hand-in-hand and while I’m good at planning certain things, there are other areas of life where I’m still go-with-the-flow. This latter attitude sometimes means I miss out on things I want to do. I don’t want to wait for a better time or day or year or season of life.
  5. This year I want to keep working on my after-40 goals and that will require intention. I’m no longer in a place where time or money or kids is an excuse. (I mean, there are still limitations on all of those things, but they aren’t impossible obstacles.) One thing I’ve already done this month is set aside time each week to start learning sign language with my daughter so we can communicate with my niece/her cousin. It’s too important for us to just think “we’ll get to that later.” We started already, and we have a long way to go.

I could probably keep adding to this list, but I’m starting to feel a little overwhelmed. Energized, too, but definitely overwhelmed. Intention requires attention and effort and it’s a good thing I got a lot of practice at being awake to my life last year so I could walk into this year with a renewed sense of purpose.

And just to be clear: this isn’t about living life at full throttle, never slowing down to take it all in or rest. Slowing down, resting, breathing deeply, silence, listening–these are all things that also require intention. I need to build them into my life.

So this is where I start. With my eyes, heart and mind turned to intention and all the ways that it has the potential to show up in my life this year.

Have you picked a word yet? (Maybe one picked you!) I’d love to hear about it.

Workiversary

One year ago, I went to work.

That’s such an ordinary statement, especially now, after a year has passed, but at the time, it felt big. Like, really big. And important.

It had been nearly a month of clearances and trainings and paperwork leading up to that day, and I remember walking out of my orientation the day before with an ID in my hand and a kinda sorta plan for the next day. Ready or not, the job was waiting for me.

My memory is fuzzy about a lot of things from this past year, mostly because there are so many experiences. I remember how quite a few of my first days were two-hour delays, which was an extra measure of grace as I learned my job, although it made getting into any kind of routine difficult for a few weeks. And I remember thinking how fortunate I was to have a job with the same schedule as my kids, especially on these delay days. I’m not good with spur-of-the-moment plan changes that require extra effort for decisions like “what do we do with the kids?”

Two weeks into my job, before I’d even received a paycheck, I wrote this longish post about what it meant for our family to have a second income, even if it was small. (It’s kind of a financial history of our family, and it is some of the rawest stuff I’ve ever written.)

A year later, I can still say that this job has been more than just a paycheck. If it was just a paycheck, I’m not sure I’d still be doing it. The extra money has been nice for our family, yes. We’ve reduced our debt load though not completely eliminated it, and we were able to make wise decisions to benefit our family’s overall wellbeing, not just get by or survive. (The differences between thriving and surviving and huge, and it is hard to bridge that gap.)

But beyond the money, this job has awakened something inside of me.

When I was little, I would dream of being a teacher. (It’s the same life goal my daughter has now.) I don’t know if it was because I liked school and I mostly looked up to my teachers or because I sort of liked being “in charge.” Or maybe it was because school was my whole world and I didn’t really know anything different. Somehow, this “dream” faded and I decided I was too shy to stand in front of a group of children (whatever their age) and lead them day-in and day-out.

When I think back on it, I wasn’t just shy, I also wasn’t confident. If I had attempted being a teacher earlier in life, I don’t think it would have worked out. Even at age 40, going to school every day, where there are teenage students, is a test of confidence. Mostly I consider it all practice for the fast-approaching days of parenting teenagers. 

People have asked me if I would consider going back to school to get my teaching degree and if they had seen how much I initially resisted applying for this job, they might not ask. Truthfully, I’m not ready to even look into it. I’m not sure it’s what I’m meant to do and as long as I don’t get any more information, I can’t consider it further. (This is me sticking my head in the sand. )

While I might not have made a good teacher in my 20s and 30s, for some reason, being a paraprofessional (I heard a friend call it “parapro” for short and this makes me sound like a superhero, so this abbreviation stays.) in my 40s is the exact right fit.

Maybe it’s the kids I serve. They tug at my heartstrings, and I have lots of room in my heart for them. I am at a place in my life where I care deeply for others. (This has not always been the case.) Much internal work led to this, but I feel really lucky that five days a week I get to act on my compassion for others in tangible ways.

I was so scared that my new job would somehow diminish what I think is my life’s work as a writer. That somehow my purpose for living would seem less. But the truth is I feel more alive now than I ever have. I can look at the time I spent at home, trying to put words to the page, trying to make something happen with my writing, binge-watching Netflix and scheduling coffee dates in the city with more honesty now. While I’m glad I had the opportunity to rediscover myself after years of stay-at-home parenting, and while I cherished the freedom those days allowed and the experiences I was able to have working with refugees, overall I was drowning a little bit. I can see the slow slide into something in the neighborhood of depression. I know myself well enough to know that if I don’t have to leave the house, I won’t. Comfy clothes, sporadic showers, too many snacks–this was my life, and it wasn’t the dream I tried to make it out to be.

Photo by Hannah Busing on Unsplash

These five hours I work outside the house now force me to do a lot of good things. Interact with adults, for example. Wear clothes that look good. And make better use of my time. When my days are full, there is no “I’ll do it tomorrow” for important things. (I mean, I still do put things off, but not as frequently.) I have to budget my time. I have to make use of the two hours after work before the kids come home. This is when I run or squeeze in an errand. I wake up most days at 6 to get some writing in before we start getting ready for school and work. Before, I would crawl out of bed about the same time as the kids because all I felt I really needed to do was get them ready for school and on the bus. Then it was “me” time. (And that often meant more coffee, second breakfast, and/or a trip into the city.)

I feel more productive and purposeful. Maybe more tired, too, but not always. It’s a funny thing, how this work doesn’t drain me even though it requires more of my mental and physical energy than staying at home did. I am energized by the work and therefore able to keep moving, most days, when I get home while still being appropriately tired at night.

Initially, I thought I was taking this job for the good of my family. For the extra income. And I was. But I didn’t realize that I was actually doing it for me. How much I needed to do something that wasn’t directly for my husband or my kids. These hours at work are all mine and I think it makes my conversation a little more interesting because I have done something all day and I have new work friends I can tell my family about. How for a few hours a day, my life is about something more than what’s inside the walls of my house.

And I think I serve my family better now because my whole world isn’t about them. (This dynamic is still a little bit mysterious to me because I know other women who serve their families so well by staying home. We are all different with different needs.)

So, it’s been a year. And I’m celebrating that because my life is richer for having this job, and it was the first of many steps I needed to take to be more me.