Category Archives: Pushpins (Daily Life)

The Natural Sequel of an Unnatural Beginning

09 Wednesday Sep 2015

Posted by in Literature, Pushpins (Daily Life), The Creative Life

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I’ve been thinking a lot about Jane Austen’s Persuasion. Over the past few weeks, the following line from the novel slipped through my mind as I’ve walked to work, made a cup of tea, and absently stared at my balcony’s potted plants (when I should have been doing work): “[Anne Elliot] had been forced into prudence in her youth, she learned romance as she grew older: the natural sequel of an unnatural beginning.” 

The line refers to the life narrative of the novel’s main character, Anne Elliot. As a young woman of nineteen, her family persuaded her to reject the marriage proposal of Captain Wentworth, because he didn’t have a large enough fortune to provide a comfortable life for her. This was the prudence that she learned in her youth. Eight years later, she and Captain Wentworth meet again. He has made his fortune as a Naval officer in the Napoleonic Wars; she has rejected another suitor and learned to regret her earlier decision. They get a second chance, and this time, Anne, tempered by experience and wisdom, finally says yes to the dashing captain. As Jane notes, this is Anne’s “natural sequel of an unnatural beginning.” Most young people learn such lessons of love and coupling the other way around.

“The natural sequel of an unnatural beginning.” What a phrase. I think about it a lot, especially after turning thirty this summer. Looking back, I hardly recognize the person I was at twenty, and like Anne, I have learned a few life lessons in a backwards fashion. I have become less serious, less quiet, less wrapped up in the folds of my inner life this past decade. I often hid from my peers behind a book—or behind the words in a beautifully constructed paragraph—yet as the decade went forward, I relied less on books and more on the company and love and supportive energy of my life’s beloveds. A mode of being that many of my peers had engaged in since their parents dropped them off at kindergarten, but something I only learned as an adult, struggling with the demands and loneliness of a graduate school program. That is my natural sequel of an unnatural beginning. 

And yet, there was a sequel, to my life and to Anne’s, one that was not dictated by social expectations or some stock human narrative. Our narratives were formed through our choices and our willingness to examine and grow from them—and honestly, I prefer it that way.

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Late Summer Spiders

02 Wednesday Sep 2015

Posted by in Gardening, Pushpins (Daily Life), The Creative Life

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Sunbeams from the August sun slip their way through iron latticework and stretch themselves out onto my balcony’s floor. My foot treads over these morning pools of light, and I am happy for their pleasant warmth before the heat of the day. I am still bleary-eyed, half-listening to the voices of John Oliver and Andy Zalztman floating out of my phone and through my open bedroom door. I am not yet awake enough to comprehend their podcast’s creative bullshittery, but that will soon come. For now, I am awake enough to water my balcony’s container garden.

The plants, encircled by their neat little pots, seem to spread themselves out, stretching in the morning sun. Basil, nasturtium, watercress, thyme, dill, and lettuce—all swollen with the quiet voluptuousness of a late summer garden. As I tip my pitcher down to wet the soil, a sunbeam sparks in my periphery. I turn towards it. There, catching the edge of a lettuce leaf is a thread of spider silk, coruscating in the morning sun. It stretches out to the iron latticework at the balcony’s edge as its crystalline twin runs a similar path eight inches above it. In between these parallel lines spirals the ingenuity and nature of a spider.

I stare at the web. It’s lovely.

I like spiders. Well, I should say that I like them in a garden setting. I do not like spiders when they drop down from my kitchen ceiling and surprise me. That sort of behavior usually gets them put in a drinking glass and promptly taken out to the back garden or balcony: you know, places that happily play to their strengths. Places where their intricate webs trap the insects that eat young and vulnerable plants.

A breeze moves through the balcony space, ruffling the lettuce leaves. But this is not the mild-mannered breeze of a summer day, this is a stiff breeze, somewhat cool, somewhat hinting at the beginning of another season—one that is usually festooned with bright leaves and cinnamon-spiced beverages. The lettuce leaf shakes violently and the thread that adorned its edge is gone, leaving the web sagging and lopsided.

Then the spider appears. It carefully picks its way across the damaged web before jumping out into the empty space between web and leaf, trailing a long, silken tendril behind it. The spider lands on the corner of the table that holds the pots, and attaches the new thread. It then climbs the thread back to its web, and begins again the process of weaving.

I walk back into my bedroom to the sound of Andy beginning an epic punrun. I should leave the spider to its work. Yes spiders are wonderful garden companions, but I love spiders the most for their creativity and courage. I admire their ability to jump out into the unknown to weave new webs, especially in the wake of damaging, unexpected winds.

Hawks and Walks

01 Wednesday Apr 2015

Posted by in Pushpins (Daily Life), Religious Exploration

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My Tuesday morning walk to work kept me more in my head than usual. As I stomped along, half listening to Rowan Williams (former Archbishop of Canterbury) gently drone on about the Chronicals of Narnia and how Aslan is an unpredictable, un-tamed lion, my mind wondered about the details of the coming day, both practical and existential: How would I meet a publishing deadline? How would I manage my typical work duties with a day-long trip to Hartford thrown in for good measure? 

And most importantly, how would I get through this season of change? Yale’s graduation is only two months away, and when it comes, I shall have to say goodbye to people I deeply care about. I don’t want them to go. I selfishly want them to stay, to continue being part of this quirky, intellectual town and my life. I’m not ready to say goodbye. I don’t ever want to say goodbye.

And that’s when I felt an overwhelming need to look above me. There soared a hawk, white and gold in the morning light. It circled overhead and finally perched on the top of a church, a few feet from an empty crucifix.

I again thought of Aslan. Rowan Williams was right, Aslan is not a tame lion—you never know what he will next do. And so it is with life. Daily, we must stare into the unknown. Anything could happen, but you must trust, you must rise above the unsettling details, only if for a moment, and search for the longer, wider scope of your narrative. For no life is measured by a single group of details, it is measured by the whole of them. 

 

Process Learning and Pavement

25 Wednesday Mar 2015

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The weather is finally showing semblances of spring here in New Haven, and for me, that means one thing: I can run outside again. Seriously, I’m like an excitable puppy about this–the hills, the fresh air, the trees make me stupidly happy and I never, ever, want to come back inside.

But there is one snag in this joyous transition. And it comes in the form of uneven pavement, located in the sidewalk outside of  the Yale Hockey rink. As usual, my foot caught this bit, and I went flying forward. It took me a second to regain my balance, but I did, and my run continued.

That spot always messes with me. It was the spot where I fell and skinned my knee the week my mother died, it was the spot where I fell and bruised my knee after an article I wrote was rejected. And this spring was no different: it caught my foot, and I went flying forward.

Yet, this time I didn’t fall.

Yes, I was caught off balance, but I didn’t fall. And I think there is a lesson in that.

The Frivolous Internet Post :)

11 Wednesday Mar 2015

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I couldn’t make up my mind about what to post this week. I was working on two different pieces: one about Daylight Savings Time and human mortality, the other about giving up the f-word for Lent (and failing horribly). But, I decided to take the advice of my homegirl Jane Austen and: “let other pens dwell on guilt and misery.” I’m not posting either. It’s been a long winter here in New England, and I need a proper giggle, heavily seasoned with joy and mirth. Perhaps you need that, too. And so, I humbly present you with a list of internet frivolity that never fails to make me laugh. Enjoy!

1. Jane Austen Fight Club

Things get real when teacups start to fly.

2. Your LL Bean Boyfriend

Okay, so this tumblr doesn’t make me laugh—but, handsome men, especially handsome men who are thoughtful and outdoorsy, always make me smile.

http://yourllbeanboyfriend.tumblr.com/

3. Tom Hiddleston Teaches Cookie Monster Delayed Gratification.

My favorite Sesame Street character and my favorite actor teach our young an important life skill.

P.S. Tom Hiddleston seems to win the internet. Especially if winning the internet involves being cheeky, kind, nerdy, and ridiculously adorable.

4. Last Week Tonight’s YouTube Channel

Oh, I am stupidly fond of John Oliver’s satirical, sensitive, silly masterpiece. I have a big literary crush on the show’s brilliant writing, so I couldn’t choose just one video! Enjoy this channel. Play it on loop. And definitely check out the clips on: FIFA, net neutrality, Warren Harding’s love letters, the Salmon Cannon, Conservatives reading Ayn Rand, Scotland, UK Labour Party’s Barbie bus, U.S. territories, Daylight Saving Time, and Totally Rad GOP Commercials.

https://www.youtube.com/user/LastWeekTonight/featured

Note: John is British and likes to use the f-word (a lot). I do not mind this because the f-word is a very versatile, fascinating word. But, your boss might. This is NSFW.

5. Neil Gaiman Supports the Onion for a Pulitzer Prize

Gaiman is fabulous. He is also British and enjoys using the f-word. This too, is NSFW.

Writer’s Block

04 Wednesday Mar 2015

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“Well…balls. Really big, hairy balls.”

I say this as I stare at a blank portion of screen in Microsoft Word. The sentences of past writing sessions stream before and after this space, for pages and pages, but I cannot marvel at their existence now. I must write 300 words in that blank space: 300 words that will tell me what will happen next, 300 words that will bring the beginning and end of a novel draft closer to completion.

I wrinkle my brow. It’s only 300 words. That’s not a lot. Though today it feels like a lot. Today, the thought of writing even 50 words feels painful and anxiety inducing.

Thanks, writer’s block. I have no idea what to say. I don’t know what direction to take my characters in. I don’t know how to continue the plot.

And that’s when I stop, walk into my kitchen, and make a pot of tea.

And as I pack tea leaves into a tea ball, my mind begins to wander: Why? Why don’t I know my characters’ directions? Why don’t I know how to continue the plot?

Asking “Why?” always helps my writer’s block.

The answer starts to present itself as I lower the tea ball into an empty teapot. I don’t know my characters’ directions, because I’m jealous of them. In their fictional lives, love and intimacy are just next door for them. They find it happily in friends and significant others who live out daily nothing’s with them. The people who are dearest to me are peppered about the United States and the world—marvelous, if you like to write letters and travel (which I do), but not so marvelous when you need a shoulder to sob into or someone to tell you about the trivial details of their day. My lack of words was my petty attempt not to face my jealousy.

I don’t know where the plot is going because it’s moving in directions beyond my life experience. My lack of words in this case is a symptom of my insecurity that a reader, a editor, a publisher, will notice that I am out of my league and make fun of me for it.

I carefully pour hot water into the teapot with the packed tea ball. Into this hollow, ceramic vessel flows water, which soon will be tea. And I think of that blank space that waits for me in Microsoft Word. It may not contain 300 words, but it is flowing with existential questions. Questions I must notice and answer as I write on. I’ll need more than 300 words to do that.

An Unmade Bed: Living the Messy Process

18 Wednesday Feb 2015

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About a month ago, my friend Kim wrote an excellent blog post about writing in the morning. I read it at the beginning of January, on a train ride from New York to New Haven. The post was full of luscious descriptions of gourmet oatmeal and the pure joy of putting together sentences. The whole piece was a pleasure to read, but one line stood out in particular to me: Kim wanted her readers to enjoy their morning drafts, to revel in their messiness, to take delight in slipping outlandish ideas and sentences into their work before their inner editor woke up. “Much of life” she wrote, “is messy process folks, not product.” This line made me laugh hysterically, startling the reveries of my fellow train passengers, but I didn’t care. I laughed because her words felt so damn true.

It turns out that my friend’s line was a prolific harbinger, giving shape to my next thirty days. My January was quite messy—full of chaos, lessons, and growth. It was a time that stretched my understanding of life, essay writing, librarianship, and human nature. And during that month, I was rarely able to make my bed. My mornings before work found me on my laptop, typing in a sea of blankets, before throwing on work clothes and running out the door. During the day, no bedspread calmed this unruly sea. The blankets stayed rumpled and exposed, with grammar and theology books hiding in their folds.

Not having time to make my bed felt odd. It’s one of those morning rituals that makes me feel like I have life in order. That I can be just as flawless and put together as a smooth bedspread and artistically placed pillows. But I wasn’t this past January and didn’t have the time to make believe that I was. There was nothing finished about January—I was in a process, growing and creating. And a made bed is a product. But a rumpled, unmade, bed is a space of possibility, a place to live into an ever changing life.
The right companion for a messy process.

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Broadchurch: Snap Judgements and Scottish Accents

11 Wednesday Feb 2015

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In last week’s post, I mentioned that I couldn’t watch Broadchurch because, in it, David Tennant lacked his Scottish accent. I do not like to live my life in such broad and ridiculous judgments, so, my sentiments bothered me for the next few days. What sort of shallow, silly girl stops watching a show because she only finds the main character attractive if he’s rolling his r’s and blurrily calling people “little madam” in a slightly sassy way? Apparently me. Oh, add to that a script that is stunted and awkward, and one’s interest in a show goes to hell.

I eyed Broadchurch every time I looked at my Netflix queue over those days of questioning. Surely, I’m better than this. Friends, who have sensible and discriminating taste, liked the show a lot. Maybe I should give it another go. Maybe I was too hard on an American accented David Tennant.

I pressed play and was immediately thrown into a confusion. The first episode’s overall aesthetic was grainier than I remembered, while across the screen paraded cup after cup of tea and awesome English actor after awesome English actor. Many whom I recognized from London stage productions and Dr. Who.

I pushed pause. Wait. What was I watching? The Broadchurch I was writing about last week was a distinctly American show, David Tennant was talking like a cowboy and he had a sexy blond sidekick. This show had tea and people skulking about on rocky beaches and in back gardens. This Broadchurch was definitely English. Plus, the cinematography was gripping, and the acting and writing, beautifully nuanced.

I calmed my confusion with a quick google search. Apparently, I had mixed up Broadchurch with Gracepoint. Gracepoint is the American spin-off of Broadchurch. Both star David Tennant and center around the murder of an eleven-year-old boy in a sleepy beach town. It was Gracepoint, not Broadchurch, that had so bummed me out earlier this year.

Well…this show of tea and beaches and English stage actors could still bum me out. David Tennant had yet to grace the screen. I pressed play and rolled my eyes. I was holding my breath in anticipation. I am ridiculous to care about this…but, will he or won’t he?

Finally, David Tennant’s angular face, framed by floppy redish hair, appeared in a closeup shot. He glowered at the camera and opened his mouth….

I delightedly squealed.

YES!!! DAVID TENNANT HAS A SCOTTISH ACCENT!!!!

I made a huge mistake. I’m going to like Broadchurch after all.

Miss Fisher’s Murder Mysteries: My Show for All Seasons

04 Wednesday Feb 2015

Posted by in Feminism, Pushpins (Daily Life)

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My Netflix habits are stupidly predictable. Every time I open up my laptop, or power up my PS3, the same sequence of inane ritual ensues: I stare long and hard at my current video queue, mostly containing television shows my friends recommended and intellectual films I found compelling, at least in theory, when I hadn’t had a busy day at work, or, been chasing after a lively three-year-old who was happily determined to vanquish all of the monsters in my apartment (they live in the upholstery, apparently). Should I watch the American House of Cards? No. I’m not in the mood to watch people be crafty, amoral, douche-canoes to each other. How about Broadchurch? Oh God, no. David Tennant without a Scottish accent makes my heart melancholy (seriously, the world is a much sadder, blander place if Mr. Tennant isn’t gustily rolling his r’s). War of the Buttons? Le Sigh. Not at all. I’m too tired to struggle through the French and watch people, especially young children in Nazi occupied France, be horrible to each other.

Media, media everywhere, but not a thing to watch.

I then quickly scroll through the other suggestion lists that orderly present themselves on the screen. I’ve watched pretty much everything from the “Period Drama Featuring a Strong Female Lead,” section. Heck, I’ve been watching and reading stuff in that category since I was twelve. The same goes for ” Film Based on a Book.” Usually, I’ve already read the book and don’t want the film to ruin it—or, I’ve already watched the film, because I read the book. “Quirky Independent Films” are never quirky or independent enough for me and “Action and Adventure” only catches my eye when the Marvel Universe or Neil Gaiman are doing the storytelling…or, if Daniel Craig is running around being James Bond.

I sigh. Media, media everywhere, but not a thing to watch. Then I laugh. There, in my “Watch it Again” section, is the face of a high-cheekboned women with a black bob and a white cloche hat.

“Well Miss Fisher, it looks like I’ll be watching you—yet again.”

If you aren’t familiar with Miss Fisher’s Murder Mysteries, I highly recommend that you look into it (or at least watch the above trailer to see if it’s for you). Shown on both the Australian Broadcasting Corporation and PBS, the show’s two seasons follow the adventures of the Honorable Miss Phryne Fisher, modern woman and clever lady detective, and her circle of lively, eccentric, compassionate, friends and colleagues. These adventures take Miss Fisher and the viewer through the decadent and difficult world of 1920s Melbourne, complete with jazz clubs and anarchists and couture fashion and rum smugglers and post World War trauma and lots and lots of glamorous parties.

Miss Fisher’s Murder Mysteries is my show for all seasons. It’s writing and visual aesthetics never fail to engage me, no matter how tired my brain is. If my brain is completely shot after a long day, I can enjoy Inspector Jack Robinson’s expressive, grey-blue eyes, Miss Fisher’s stunning Art Deco wardrobe, and all the handsome fellows Miss Fisher sensitively and unapologetically makes out with. But, if my brain wants to be more engaged, I can marvel at the show’s fastidious historical detail, allowing my imagination to enter the world of 1920s Melbourne and experience its joys and worries as my own. And, if I am in full possession of my faculties, I can contemplate the beautifully written, real, complex main character. As a main female character on a popular television show, Phryne leaves me breathless. She is how women should be written—as capable, yet vulnerable human beings, full of strengths, weaknesses, and quirks. This is a character who is the sum of her experiences, and those experiences are pretty horrific: a sister murdered in her childhood, the horrors of WWI (where she served as a medic), an abusive relationship in her early twenties…yet, she lives her life with joy in the face of the trauma and the grief. Sometimes, those experiences paralyze her, but those experiences also make her compassionate, generous, and courageous. One of the things that keeps me coming back is watching her struggle with her past while boldly propelling herself into her future, determined to learn and to live life to the hilt.

Wild Jazz begins to blast from my speakers. Unlike an American sounding David Tennant, watching an episode of Miss Fisher’s Murder Mysteries for the fifth time doesn’t make my heart melancholy. It makes my heart pretty darn happy.

Urban Snowstorms and Sweet Ohio Red Wine

28 Wednesday Jan 2015

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The snow swirls and curls outside the window, I cock my head and watch it gracefully move in the late afternoon sun. Its presence is soft, muted, and gentle as it winnows through the straight streets and tall buildings of New York’s Upper East Side. By tomorrow morning, the city will be covered in a deep snow.

Being from the Snow Belt of Northeastern Ohio, snow is a winter inevitability—its manifestation involving salted roads and large expanses of forest and farmland, covered in a cold sea of solid white. But this is my first urban snowstorm. The first time I’ll seen snow embrace the busy, lived-in world of a big city.

I look away from the window and back to the laptop that sits on my lap. On a small side table to my left, is a hot cup of tea, Joseph Campbell’s The Power of Myth, and a glass of sweet Ohio red wine. I always bring back a few bottles of sweet Ohio red wine when I visit my family in the Midwest. I’ve yet to find a red wine that matches its tasty contradictions: light-bodied but rich, delicately sweet but sensuously grounded. But at this moment, I enjoy not for its contradictions, but for the sense of consistency its ruby presence gives me. Though buildings rather than trees tower outside my window, my snow rituals haven’t changed that much. In Northeastern Ohio, I too would weather out a snowy afternoon with a cup of tea, a good book, an interesting writing project, and a glass of sweet Ohio red wine.

Inspired, I hold my glass up to the window and absently swirl around its contents. The wine seems to be dancing with the snow. What a mismatched couple they seem to make:  Red and white, liquid and solid, town and country, all moving before my eyes. But are they really so poorly matched? For even in contradiction there is consistency. Won’t this snow melt, evaporate, and rain down upon the vineyards of the Hudson Valley, or even those of Northeastern Ohio, depending on the weather patterns? Won’t future clusters of grapes benefit from this snow’s liquid nurturance, and swell full of flavor and life? And won’t a Midwestern girl enjoy an afternoon of snow, even if her landscape is tall, squared buildings rather than expansive, rolling farmland?

The answer is yes, for even in contradiction there is consistency.

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