I left there, but I'm not here yet.

"To leave one's country to go
and live in another country
in inferior conditions,
that is, without a safety net
and without recourse of return
to one's native land,
this seems to me to be the last great
human adventure.

I have to explain that people don't eat
the same food,
they don't dress
in the same manner,
they don't dance to the same rhythms,
they don't have the same smells
or the same accents,
and they certainly don't dream
the same way,
but it's up to me to adapt.

I have to explain it all in a language
that is not the one my mother speaks.
That's what traveling means.

[...]

I left there,
but I'm not
here yet.
Be patient, young man, it's only been a year.

I can't tell you
exactly when this city
ceased being a foreign city
for me.
Perhaps when I stopped looking at it."

Dany Laferrière, A Drifting Year (original French version: Chronique de la dérive douce)

I saved this excerpt as a draft in Blogger exactly 1 year and 1 day ago. About two weeks before we arrived in Montreal. While I was packing up my office in our house in Germany, taking notes on this novel for my dissertation.

Laferrière's writing is beautiful and painful, and I knew it would describe my experience in the year to come. I haven't opened Blogger in a year. But I knew this excerpt was here, waiting.

The first month in Montreal, I truly didn't have time to think much less blog or reflect. Each evening was spent apartment hunting, trying to figure out where to buy groceries, and clothes, and school supplies. And find a school for my son at all.

In the fall, I thought about blogging a little. But could only think of all the comparisons I would make between Montreal and Konstanz, Quebec and Germany, North American and European life and cultural norms. How some readers would laugh and nod in agreement. And others would be offended and think, "go back where you came from!"

Then the winter rolled in and with it all kinds of struggles. Finding our feet in my old-new land has been challenging. I had no desire to process it all on the internet. We went to far-away trusted friends and mentors for counsel. We changed our minds about some things. We made some mistakes. We learned. We clung to God alone. Not even close friends or church to cling to now.

We bought our first home, a tiny urban condo smaller than the last 2 homes we've had. Just a bit bigger than the 1-bedroom half-basement that housed us for the first 5 years of our marriage. I've plugged away at my dissertation in the midst of it all, and the end is in sight. My son learned to ride a bike, and understand French, and sing in Spanish. My daughter went from a baby to a fiercely independent child, diaper-free and talking a blue streak. We've made a surprisingly large network of contacts in different neighbourhoods, churches, schools. We've made some decisions, coming back to our true selves and defining our core values.

These last few months, I've realized I miss writing, and am starting to feel free enough to do it again in this space.

I write this on the eve of our first trip back "home" to that beautiful lake and city that nurtured us for 9 years. Where we got engaged, and grew up, and learned to open up in community. City of our children's births.

I guess you could say our feet have found the ground now in Montreal.
When we get back, they can start to grow roots.

Be patient, it's only been a year.

The last great human adventure

"To leave one's country to go
and live in another country
in inferior conditions,
that is, without a safety net
and without recourse of return
to one's native land,
this seems to me to be last great human adventure."
Dany Laferrière, A Drifting Year

I write from a place of privilege.

Moving from one rich country to another, with education, passports, and family on both sides of the Atlantic makes our family a blessed and privileged kind of immigrant family. I don't know the want, terror, fears of millions of immigrants around the globe who get to a new country with no connections, no money, perhaps no education or no way to have their training acknowledged in the new land.

But still.

These past two days, as we have ticked off a few more big milestones and head into the last busy stretch of moving-packing-sorting, I feel the no safety net feelings.

I came this way a decade ago. And it was hard.

I return to my native land x 4. Blessed. No longer one, but "many."
I've got old friends and contacts in our new city, family an 8-10 hour drive away.

But still. In many ways, Canada is new to me again.

It is definitely new to my husband and children, and though we are excited, there are moments of hesitation, too. We have again tasted His faithfulness these past two months, we have a job and scholarship and provision that could be called miraculous. Thankful. Thankful. Thankful.

But still.

New everything awaits.

The night before I leave on any kind of trip, I never want to go. It goes back to the night before my much beloved one week of summer camp, which I'd saved for and looked forward to all year. I threw up in the bathroom and told my mom I didn't want to go.

I love traveling, I love the new, I get bored easily.

But still.

Something in us longs for comfort, the known, to be known.

As we sort through belongings with our 3 year old, we talk about what to take, what is important to us. Despite my desire to de-clutter, I value the important memories, the best toys, a few security objects. Journals, photo albums, a few beloved books. There is something very unnerving about giving away all of the furniture you have slowly cobbled together to make a household since you showed up with a suitcase a decade ago. Since we were both students in a 60 square meter, 1 bedroom apartment.

They are just things.
We are blessed to be able to bring a few things, but we hold tighter to each other.
And we won't pretend it isn't hard.
We'll probably shed tears, and hold friends close, and part of us will wish we could stay.
We'll let ourselves mourn this season, even as we rejoice in the next.

the last great human adventure.

Iron sharpens iron {we need each other}

This past week this proverb has been reinforced to me so tangibly.

I spend most of my weekdays alone at home working in the mornings, or alone at home with my kids in the afternoons. Beyond the quick chats with other parents and caregivers at Kindergarten, or the occasional afternoon play date, I sometimes do not talk to another adult until my husband comes home in the evening. Social media can give you the feeling of being connected to the outside world, but it is very shallow communication. Very rarely are we honest and authentic online. We do not bare our souls or ask our big questions (nor perhaps should we!). A "like" or re-tweet will never replace a friend's hug or someone looking into your eyes and truly seeing you.

As an introvert, I need time to recover after a full day or two of being with people. I need time to process, journal, contemplate things I have heard, seen, experienced. After a busy day I lay in bed thinking, no matter how tired I am, until my mind whirs to a stop. I can feel alone in a crowd, I find small-talk difficult and when things get awkward or difficult my default mode is to flee.

But I also desperately need people.

Those of us contemplative types can just get lost in our own heads, analyzing, and debating, praying and seeking, but perhaps we are just too close to see the full picture, blind to our blind spots.

This past week, feeling weighed down, confused, and discouraged, a friend spoke the words I needed to hear and prayed for me the conviction that was already pressing in on my heart. On my one day at the university, I ran into a colleague who encouraged, gave perspective, and showed me light at the end of the dissertation tunnel. Then my half-a-world-away sister gave me practical help proofreading some documents via email, improving my work with her talent and skills. I was so much the better for them; my spirit calmer, my mind sharper, my heart happier, thanks to them.

I felt my iron getting sharpened.

Oh, how we need each other. I am learning that even the most put-together, successful-seeming person deals with bouts of self-doubt, insecurity, discouragement. All the people you are intimidated of may just as well be intimidated of you. Every woman I know struggles at times with feeling alone, feeling like her friends never call, that she is the only one who is left out.

Let's be the first to love, to pick up the phone, to encourage, to stop and see someone and listen. Let's ask for help when we need it, let's be vulnerable with friends or family or pastoral leaders close to us, show them who we are. Let's be present where we are now, sharpening each other.

The Trail

Hiking those familiar trails
felt like coming home
to a place I had lived in thrice.

weeks, months, weeks

In a lifetime, short
but pivotal
times
of learning, growing, stretching, straining, singing
laughing, cherishing, changing, celebrating.

Moments on benches and paths
scribbled prayers
tear-stained journal
Surrender and new life.

The Alpine air filling lungs broad and clean
built strong on the spiritual heritage in this place.

I am reminded of lessons learned, mentors gone before, strangers-become-friends who shouldered packs and hiked for hours in front and behind me.
Incompatible tribe
different nations
different ages
different allegiances and preferences
different everything
but one God.
And the strong and fast took the heavy things from the weaker, slowed their pace, took the last place in line.
And we pressed on 
and we listened and we tore down borders and we let each other in and we learned to love 
in spite of it all.

They taught me that I too can love 
those whom I at first didn't like, 
with whom I had nothing in common. 

They taught me why Church matters, 
that I need others
to be fully who I am meant to be.
That those fruits of love, 
joy
peace
patience 
kindness 
goodness 
faithfulness
gentleness 
self-control 
only grow in the rich soil of community
Fertilized with annoyance and waiting and offense and hurt.

They taught me to go from this place 
and put down roots and let people in. 

And, eventually, I did 
and I am grateful for 
that motley tribe and what they teach me still, 
when I remember.

I am reminded that the trail 
is sometimes flat and open and comes easily. 
The ground springs beneath my boots, coniferous cushion.

But sometimes it is steep and arduous
and I have to put my head down
and need an encouraging word to get to the top.



The trail is sometimes muddy
and I have to slog my way through
and progress can only be made slowly.

Sometimes the trail is littered
with branches 
or it is closed 
and we have to find another way
and there are obstacles to overcome. 



Sometimes the fog descends and we can't see the peak 
or even the next bend
but 
there are trail markers, if you look for them.
And if I missed it someone on my team has spotted it 
and they show me which way to take
so we keep going
together.



I am reminded 
that I don't need to know what awaits today
or exactly where the trail leads
if I trust the Guide.

(And we never really know it)

I can see the next step, and that is enough

to follow.

Live fully

I was reminded the other day by a wise friend to live fully where I am now.  To be faithful where I am today, the people and places in front of me now. We are in a time of transition, changes are coming. It seems easier to shut down emotionally, just a bit. To distance myself, to hold back. To revert to my hermit-like tendencies. There is much to do. But I find when I focus only on my own family, my own plans, my own career that I am soon empty.

It's when I am giving to others, listening, giving time, a word of encouragement, pouring myself out that others might be refreshed, that I have the deepest joy.

When I am living for more than myself, I am truly alive.

Another friend told me today of a tragedy, a young mother gone suddenly, shockingly. Leaving behind three little children. The youngest of whom is fighting cancer, now without his mama.



We only have today. Let us be thankful for this place, this season, here. Let us engage with the people and relationships here and now, that we might not be filled with regret.

Let us love deeply, and live fully.

Let us give up ourselves, to get more of His life, true life.

On having no idea where I am going

It has been a little quiet around here, I've been tuning out of most blogs and social media lately. I feel a need to quiet my mind, fill myself with God's Word, to open my mouth and eat what he gives me. And it is "as sweet as honey in my mouth."

We're in a season of seeking, listening and planning. Looking back and looking forward. I dug out my journals and notebooks from a decade ago. Sometimes I shake my head at the folly of my ways, sometimes in wonder at my youthful boldness and wisdom, and mostly I bow it in thankfulness for God's faithfulness and all that He has done. He has led and guided when I was all confusion and striving and questions. He has done far more than I ever asked or imagined. I have so much peace going into this next season knowing who holds me, us, our little lambs. As our pastor reminded us beautifully in church this morning, the other disciples stayed in the boat while Peter stepped out bravely on the waves, thinking the boat was safer. But that little fishing boat in the storm was never safe. Either way, He has always been the one holding me.

Everything I knew and believed 10 years ago has been taken apart and put back together again since, through the storms of depression, changing continents and countries, culture shock and wedding planning in a foreign culture, moving, marrying, being student-poor newlyweds, planting ourselves in a church for the first time (really putting down deep roots), writing theses, graduating, first jobs, having babies, moving again. 

It's funny, even, to see things I wrote a decade ago still ring true today. To see many of the same truths and adages, now believed with even greater conviction of a bit more life experience.

I came across the prayer of Thomas Merton copied out in my journal, sent to me by my sister. I prayed it with all my confused little heart back then, and rest today in the firm knowing that he has led me by the right road, a good road and still, he leads me on.

My Lord God, I have no idea where I am going.
I do not see the road ahead of me.
I cannot know for certain where it will end.
Nor do I really know myself, 
and the fact that I think I am following Your will does not mean that I am actually doing so. 
But I believe that the desire to please You
does in fact please you.
And I hope I have that desire in all that I am doing.
I hope that I will never do anything apart from that desire.
And I know that, if I do this, You will lead me by the right road,
though I may know nothing about it.
Therefore I will trust You always though I may seem to be lost
and in the shadow of death.
I will not fear, for You are ever with me,
and You will never leave me to face my perils alone.

Baby jet lag

Baby jet lag has to be the worst kind of jet lag.

There is no reasoning with her. There is no keeping a baby up til an appropriate time to sleep...her head just nestles into my chest, no matter where, no matter when, no matter how bright or loud and she is asleep. This past week since we got home from visiting my family in Ontario and friends in Montreal has been rough: way too little sleep, mommy back to work, planning and enjoying our 3 year old man's birthday with a house full of friends, preparing for both kids to start Kindergarten and Krippe (day care in Germany for ages 1-3) in the coming weeks. My husband is now away for the weekend at an important family event 1000km away in Flensburg.

Baby up one night baking her brother's birthday cake
with Papa. Yup, you read that clock right.

I managed to get both kids to sleep before 9 p.m. tonight, the closest to normal this household has been for the past 8 nights. Jet lag, both the adult and baby versions, have kept me up much of the night this past week. It has sometimes felt unbearable, entertaining a child who is wide awake when the parents are just aching for sleep, but at times we have loved those sweet midnight hours, allowing for heart-to-heart talks in the quiet of moonlight and a nocturnal writing session to pour out the too busy thoughts.

We have big decisions ahead of us, ideas, passions, responsibilities, plans whirling in and out. Lying down next to my baby to keep her from crawling and practising her standing skills all night forces not only her but also me to breathe deeply. To still and calm our nervous muscles, our busy minds. Not to jump up and get on with to-dos and cleaning and emails. Waiting for her to calm, to breathe rhythmically. To pray for her in whispers, for all of us. Speak out truth and quiet the doubts and fears.

Be still (living in the tension between here and there)

My mind is full, neck is stiff, right wrist is cracking and cramping from too many arrow strokes down and mouse clicks. There are articles to read, sort, take notes on. Books to be ordered through inter-library loans; fortunately HiWis (student assistants) are still on duty to photocopy the dozens and dozens of pages. An abstract to be sent in for a conference. Suitcases to pack, travel arrangements to be made, last-minute gifts to be purchased and Canadian dollars to pick up from the bank.

We're flying to Canada on Friday. It will be the first time I have seen my brother and sisters, their spouses and children (our kids have 7 Canadian cousins. Actually 2 of those are Americans, technically.) in two years. My parents were able to come and see us in Montreal in April 2012 when we were there for a research trip for my PhD, and were also able to visit us last fall. But I miss those dear siblings of mine! We have lived apart for the past 15 years, first scattered all over North America and then I took the leap across the pond in 2004 making it notably harder to visit. I am grateful they all made the trip to Germany for our wedding in 2006; I know (even better now) what a sacrifice an overseas trip can be when you've got a young family.

At last my siblings et al. will meet our baby girl, who is almost not a baby anymore. There will be splash pads to visit, walks among the Tulip trees and sandy beaches (with hopefully no biting flies) at Rondeau Park, wiener roasts over the campfire on our parents' farm. I am hoping to score some more mint-condition kids books at local yard sales. Two years ago we saw a family with a few tables and blankets full of goods spread out on the front lawn in my tiny hometown, so we pulled over. When I inquired about the price of Bear Snores On the mom looked at me hopefully, "Maybe 25 cents?" Sold. Bear Snores On has become our favourite since then, inspiring many a bear cave of couch cushions and popcorn and black tea parties.

More than the packing and travel plans, my heart is reeling from all the Big Thoughts and Plans my husband and I have been talking over the past few days. Priorities, dreams, realigning the course of our future to what is most important to us and where we sense God tugging our hearts and footsteps. Remembering passions and ideas suppressed or left dormant out of necessity. Following Jesus into the great unknown, where feet may fail. The aches and tension in my body indicate that I am holding on too tightly to worry, to fear, to expectation and excitement and just Thinking. Too. Much.

Breathe in, breathe out. Have a coffee and take in the view from the top of the Mensa (cafeteria) overlooking our lake and the Mainau. There is a tension, living in the now, between here and there.

Be still and know that He is God.

The Blog Backstory

I'm new to blogging. 

The nudge came while on a walk after a particularly stimulating Sunday in church back in November (2012). Start a blog to force me to write regularly and - if I'm brave enough - actually tell people about it. I always wanted to be a writer, writing reams and reams of stories when I was a child, easily maxing out the 100 points we had to earn for Writer's Workshop at school. (I wrote 20+ page stories for about 40 points while some classmates wrote "advertisements" and "recipes" repeatedly for 5 points a pop. Chacun son goût.) My favourite character on The West Wing (best TV show of all time) was Sam Seaborn, speechwriter to the President, a secret fantasy career of mine. I'll admit it: I actually settled on Political Science as one of my two majors in my first year at university because of an episode of the West Wing. (Perhaps not surprising that basing your choice of career on an idealized Hollywood television program is not setting you up for a win. Although I still love following politics, just not mathematically analyzing them.) 

A pic of Sam Seaborn. Why not?

It seems logical from that summary of my childhood passion for writing (and reading British classics my brother brought home from uni) that I should study literature, however I came to do my Ph.D. in literature in a roundabout way. I've been writing and proofreading scholarly articles and books for years, but it feels good to have another outlet for other thoughts.

The idea of blogging freaked me out in several ways. I started reading a few blogs in the winter of 2010-11, after our first child was born and I found myself at home, breastfeeding and holding the baby for long periods, but with my mind free to roam and also a loneliness from being at home so much. (It is no mystery why so-called mommy blogs are so popular/prolific. Moms of babies and toddlers are desperate for contact with the outside world and mind-food.)  I found several blogs that I loved, and which gave me new ideas about all range of matters. But the whole mommy-blog scene, and the often negative-critical-soapbox-Christian-opinion-blogs in North America made me very hesitant to start one of my own. Among my friends in Germany, few read blogs and I don't think anyone I know has one.

Another thing that freaked me out was sharing my life, my thoughts, my quivering, vulnerable creative efforts, openly and publicly with the Whole Wide World. Even scarier, showing it to people who actually know me.  (At first I didn't post it on FB for fear that everyone I know might read it.) The possibility that your in-laws or your neighbour or your boss could read it are legitimate threats. Which adds to the thrill, the bravery required and the honesty. So far, I'm loving it. It totally scares me still, but a month of blogging is already stirring up more creativity in me than the intervening 13 years since OAC Writer's Craft. And so far, it's a lot of fun.

I didn't actually act on the nudge to start this blog until 7 months later, as is obvious from the links to previous posts over there --->. There were more nudges and prompts, so I finally just threw myself into it, screw the terrible layout and colour scheme. (Help me, please, designer and programmer friends!) I just want to write. To fan into flame the gifts within me. To throw my shoulders back, look you in the eye and declare: I am a writer.

A day after I started, my husband reminded me that I actually had a blog before. I had totally forgotten this fact. How bizarre, to totally blank out on something of that nature. I was tickled to discover this blog still exists online! So if anyone wants to read the (sometimes hilarious, sometimes embarrassing) musings of a much younger me about my early days of living in Germany and adjusting to life here, go to JoyIsMyMiddleName. 

St-Jo

As I progress along the way I have taken, the mist continues its steady, silent descent. It creeps around the cape as if on tiptoe and seeps earthward from its undefined mass above. Perhaps it is merely a blurring of the eye, its gentle descent so subtle that it is impossible to determine where the mist begins until the formless dark mass of forest evaporates into grey tinged cloud.

Somehow the minute village had developed an all too familiar urban likeness. The two main streets, however provincial to some, had become like highways in relation to the town's size. As soon as the frost breaks from the rocky soil the construction crews invade, bringing their backhoes and jackhammers. It is meticulous work, a painfully slow series of closing and then reopening the narrow streets and their hastily constructed replacements as the workers attmept to carry out their task wedged between the river and the steep, tree covered slope of the mountains.

But there are other roads in the village, those dusty, winding trails that are hidden from the constant stream of tourists rushing through town to catch the ferry. The diligent work of the construction crews has, over several years, accomplished its goal of making stretches of the roadway smooth as glass, and reduced the slope of the mountain by a  fraction, enabling the sleek cars of Quebec City lawyers to blaze by seconds faster. This is alright. For those that do know of these forgotten trails, no traffic is wanted here. 


{I found these words scrawled in the back of a notebook from 2001 when I spent May-August in St-Joseph-de-la-Rive, Quebec}