Flight 292

Wrote this yesterday while I was on the plane:

The picture on my desktop is the one of my brother and I at Boston’s Logan Airport.  When I closed my computer this morning it occurred to me that this was sort of funny.  I had just bought my breakfast at the Dunkin Donuts near my gate and sat down at a smooth granite table.  Turning my computer on to send and email, I hardly thought anything of the picture.  I immediately opened the web browser and logged on to the internet.  How often do I bypass small opportunities for momentary reflection?  Probably fairly often.  When I finished writing the email and ate the last of my bagel, I went to shut down my computer.  Before closing the screen, I realized the minor significance of the picture and how coincidental it was.  I must be about five or so in the picture, maybe six?  My brother and I are standing in front of a window at the airport, outside of which a plane is being loaded and readied.  I don’t know at which gate the picture was taken or for which trip we were heading – maybe a trip to Florida?  My brother has this great smile on his face that spreads from ear to ear and is staring directly at the camera.  I’m sort of looking off to the side and have a small grin on my face.  It’s weird to me that I can be in the same place nearly twenty years later, all on my own, heading out West.

A friend wrote me a letter a couple weeks ago, and in it he asked me what it meant when I said I “had a life in Frederiskburg.”  I haven’t responded to him yet, but I think I’m starting to form a notion of what it means.  It means I have a Virginia driver’s license and Virginia plates on my car.  It means when I go to visit my family and friends in Boston, they notice that I talk differently and say y’all and ma’am.  It means that I drink a lot of sweet tea and eat Chick fil A at least once a week.  It means that I am a Virginian.  I remember a conversation I had with a professor about a year ago.  We were discussing how long you had to live somewhere before you could say you were from the place – or at least knew it well enough to be from there.  For him, he said that he felt like he was a local in Alabama when he could give directions to someone using landmarks that no longer existed (an old gas station, etc).  Having a life in Fredericksburg means I feel like I can say I’m from there.  Not only because I know the place, but because it makes sense to me.  It makes sense to have a life where I’ve put down roots, and I’ve put down roots in Fredericksburg.

Autumn Leaves

Going through the stack of pictures today, I realized I should probably have a picture of my Great Grandmother, Harriet, in one of them soon.  So today the picture is of me, her, my mom, and my brother.  We’re in Greenfield, where my Great Uncle Tom and Aunt Cindy live.  Tom is Harriet’s son.  He’s never felt like a “Great” Uncle, but he’s technically not my Uncle, he’s my mom’s uncle, so I guess according to family tree stuff, he’s my “Great” Uncle.  Greenfield is out in Western Massachusetts, about an hour and a half or so from my parents’ house.  It’s beautiful in the fall.  There are lots of trees and the foliage is spectacular.  My Great Grandmother loved to go through the leaves on the ground and pick out her favorites and press them for later.  I have no idea what she did with them.  Maybe just save them for later, or find them in a book in the fall or spring when she’d forgotten about the brilliant colors.  Harriet saved a lot of stuff … she was kind of a saver … kind of like me.  My Grandma always reminds me that it was because she lived through the Great Depression, when you didn’t have anything to save, but when you did, you saved it.  So after that time, when there was a surplus, she saved.  I’d like to think that I don’t save quite as much as Harriet did, but … oh well.

Greenfield

 

See the bag Harriet’s carrying … I think we had that from McDonald’s or something – she was carrying it so we could take home the leaves we liked.  I like a lot of things about this picture.  I like my tights and my hair and the expression on my face.  I like that I’m just sitting in the leaves like nothing else could be better.  And I’m holding a few leaves like I was sitting there to sort through them …

Desks and Maps

I haven’t changed at all.  I literally even look the same.  Today’s photo proved this to me …

New Desk

My great-grandmother’s caption for the photo was, “Cynthia at her new desk (formerly Ann’s 1952 + later Tom’s til now)”.  Just looking at this picture I know how I felt sitting at that desk.  I love have my desk facing a window … until this year, I always made sure that my desk was facing a window or open space so that I could look out and see the world around me.  I like having things along the edges of my desk too – pictures and papers and little trinkets.  Right now I’m sitting looking at various post cards that I have up on the wall and an old map of Paris that is right behind my computer.  It’s an old map of the subway or something and there’s a stop that I remember well, Pere Lachaise.  It’s an old cemetery that has a lot of famous people buried in it.  It’s beautiful.  One of my favorite pictures that I took while I was in Paris is of that cemetery.

Pere Lachaise

I’ll always have this sense of completeness when things feel organized and neat and compact.  Like on a desk.  Seeing the papers and pens and computer and speakers on my desk make me feel like I can sit down and get something done.  Seeing the map reminds me of the places I’ve been and the things I’ve accomplished.  It encourages me to see that I have more adventures in life ahead of me …

Family Album

I’ve been running a lot more in the past couple months than ever before in my life.  It’s been really great.  I love being outside and getting fresh air, and the houses in downtown Fredericksburg that I run by are really pretty.  Not to mention we’ve had an incredibly mild winter, which if you know me, you know I’m glad for.  Today I decided to take a Sabbath.  I haven’t done that in a while, which isn’t good.  For those of you wondering, a Sabbath for me is a day of rest set apart from other “traditional” rest.  It doesn’t mean sitting on the couch watching TV or just reading a Nicholas Sparks book.  It means diving into scripture to learn more about the person of Christ, and resting in that Word.  It means praying a lot and giving myself to the Lord.  Today has been an amazing Sabbath, and I feel like I’ve worshipped the Lord more than I have in a long time.  I read through 2 Corinthians this morning and got wrecked by what I read.  It challenged me to look at how I’ve been acting and the advice I’ve been giving people and how I’ve been living my faith.  I’ll probably read it again tonight before I go to bed, so I can solidify it …

I wanted to get outside before it got dark.  So I went for a walk/run around 4:30.  It was the perfect temperature and the sun was still out.  I always think about a million things while I’m running.  Of late, I’ve realized that it’s the only time that I let my thoughts run (haha) wherever I let them and don’t hold them back.  I also talk to God a lot while I’m running, and it feels more real and intimate than any other time that I give Him.  Today while I was running I realized how I can combine two things I’ve been wanting to do for a couple weeks now.

When I was in Florida the first week in January, my aunt and uncle were going through a ton of my great grandmother’s old pictures.  She took so many freaking pictures.  And she had doubles and triples of a bunch so they gave me a bunch to take back with me.  The pictures ranged from before I was born to, a few years ago (like four or five or something).  As I kept going through the pictures, all that went through my head was, “I want to write an essay about this …” So what I’m going to do, is try and blog every day, or every other day … or whenever I get to it, and have a different picture from the (pretty substantial) stack that I have.  I might write a quick blurb about what it makes me think of, why I picked it, or an idea for a longer essay that I might start working on.  Ultimately, this project is to get me writing more, and working on a longer essay project.  I’m really excited.

Brian and Cynthia

 

This picture is of me and my brother at the airport.  My great grandmother (Harriet Hecklingner) labeled the back: “Cynthia and Brian at Logan Airport just before Sarajane and I flew to Paris.”  My brother has this great smile on his face, doesn’t he?  Like he’s really excited mom is leaving for a week, so he can do whatever he wants.  Either that or he’s just being ridiculous, like he usually is.  I like that I’m not looking at the camera.  It’s like something else is catching my attention and I’m content with that.  That’s how I’ve sort of felt the past couple weeks … I’ve let myself get distracted and confused by a lot of things, and haven’t been focused at all.  It’s really disconcerting to be all over the place like I have been for a bit now.  … In any case, my brother is leaving to study abroad tomorrow.  He’ll be in Amsterdam until June, so that’s the other reason I thought this picture was fitting.  Brian and I did a lot of traveling together as kids and those were great times.  I miss my little bro a lot.  Love you, Nuggle.

Lights, Lights, and Light

This time of year there are so many lights.  It’s one of the things that keeps the night from being so long.  People put lights on the trees in their yard, on their houses, and in their decorations.  It’s crazy to think that without electricity things would just be so much darker … I was thinking about that the other night when I was walking around the city.  In the Boston Garden, the lights looked so pretty …

Thinking about how much we rely on light to do things every day, it just made me think of how pervasive it is.  I want Christ to be that pervasive in my life.  I want Christ to be the light that continues before everything else.  At the candle light service at my home church on Christmas Eve, I looked at the lit candle in my hand and prayed for that this next year …

Figs & Boston

My first night in town, Wednesday night, my parents took me to my favorite restaurant, Figs.  There used to be a location in Wellesley, but now there is just one in Charlestown and Boston (there are two other locations, Nantucket and Palm Beach, but those obviously are a little less accessible.  We drove around for a while looking for a parking spot until I had the brilliant idea of finding a spot around the Bunker Hill Monument.  Alas, there were spaces aplenty.  Walking down the hill to the restaurant we got to gawk at all the fancy townhouses lit up for Christmas.  It was weird.  The warm rain and smell of the city made it feel like we were celebrating Easter and not Christmas.  The restaurant was loud, but the food was delicious.  I’d only ever been to the location in Boston and Wellesley, so this one was new to me.

Walking back after dinner, I looked closely at the lights lining the streets and noticed they swelled with light and dimmed slightly.  My mom informed me that they were gas lit.  This amazed me.  In a time when electricity is a prime source of energy, why would the city keep gas lights going?  I haven’t looked into it, but it was really neat, the lights looked really authentic.

We strolled around the monument after dinner and I took a couple pictures.  The view of the city from the monument was pretty neat.

I love the city.  The lights, smells, sounds, people … I’m always impressed with the history in Boston too.  I haven’t taken a huge interest in the Civil War history in and around Fredericksburg, partly because it seems too recent.  The Battle of Bunker Hill took place during the Revolutionary War – “all those guys held the hill for a while and then lost …” according to my dad.  The British won, but at great cost.  In case you didn’t figure it out, it’s an important hill overlooking the city, a strategic location for an army.

So crazy.  I love history.  I love food.  I love traveling.  I love writing.

This post probably didn’t make any sense, but … I’m ok with that.

Made New, Not Mended

I really like metaphors.  Sometimes I feel like I think in metaphors even.  On the flight back to Boston yesterday, I came across a song I had forgotten about.  It’s on an album that I downloaded from Noisetrade.  It’s called “Mended,” by the Autumn Film.  At first I was really encouraged by the song, it has a driving bass line layered with urgent chords on the piano (wasn’t that such a musically accurate description? haha).  And the lead singer’s voice is nice as well.  But listening to the words I realized how desperate the song was.  Here are the lyrics:

Safety pin me to your chest so I can stay put
Please don’t leave me in this mess cause I am this close to unraveling, unraveling

Don’t give up on me now, this can all be mended
We can iron this out, it can all be mended
When you’re tearing at the seems, it can all be mended

Little walls are tumbling down, I feel them crumble
There’s nothing left to tear down, there’s only gravel
I’m breaking out, I’m breaking down

The middle verse (or maybe chorus) is repeated two times at the end.  … There’s no way for me to know for sure what the song is talking about, but I can only assume it’s a relationship.  So it made me think of a lot of the relationships in my life, romantic and non, but primarily my relationship with Christ, and how opposite it is to mainstream culture.  There’s so much emphasis on “fixing things” and “making things work,” how cool would it be if everyone knew they had a new heart for them, a new heart that Christ gives them to love without bounds?

You don’t need to “mend” things … Christ makes all things new and better.  It’s crazy thinking that even if we try our hardest, we’ll always come short, and feel the need to mend things …

The Intricacies of Simplicity

I like things to be simple.  I like uncomplicated situations, uncomplicated relationships, and uncomplicated events.  I like eating simple meals and going for simple runs.  I like knowing what to expect and going places I’ve been before.

Unfortunately that isn’t how life always turns out though.  As it turns out, most of life is complicated and unpredictable and doesn’t ever make sense.  Especially when you think it’s going to make the most sense, it makes the least sense.  Maybe this is why I enjoy simple things even more now, because I see the complexity and intricacies of life and it forces me to recognize when there are simple aspects of life, they’re that much more enjoyable.

This morning I read the daily reading from My Utmost for His Highest.  I realized how important it is to rely on being in the freedom of Christ.  I have been saved and have become a completely new person.  So why do I look to things from my old life?  Or look to things that don’t reflect my new life?  I’m a completely new person, but it doesn’t feel like I see that or act like that.  So why do I act like that same old person sometimes?

Change isn’t simple.  Change is hard.  Life is change.  Life is hard.

Four-Wheelers, Fireworks, and Other Firsts

I wish I had pictures.  Well, there are pictures, but they’re not online yet.  I learned how to water ski!  My friend Megan lives in Maryland on the Pautuxent River and her parents have a boat.  I went out there last Monday/Tuesday (yes, a whole week ago) and learned how to ski.  It was so much fun.  I couldn’t move my entire upper body for the day or two after, but it was well worth it.  Gliding across the river was something else.  It was great to see Megan and to hang out with her parents – they are the best servants of Christ I have ever met – they served me and loved me so well.  I felt like I was on vacation for a whole week and it was only 24 hours.  That’s how well I want to love others: making them feel not only at home, but also like they belong and like they are loved and they only need to be themselves.

I came home Tuesday afternoon and worked the rest of the week (Wednesday-Saturday) and then got to hang out with Lauren and Holly after work on Saturday afternoon.  Which is where the other firsts come in.  I had never ridden on a four-wheeler, which Holly found to be an atrocity, so she had Lauren and I ride together, and then her husband Ian drove me around the small lake in their yard.  It was really fun … but I won’t be buying one any time soon.  When it got dark they brought out some of the fireworks they had bought while they were in South Carolina (where they eloped in June).  I’ve seen fireworks from afar, but never set them off myself.  Ian let me fire off a Roman Candle, I think it was called.

I guess I did take some pictures this past week or so … or at least since I’ve blogged last.  Holly has a pool at her house and there was a little gray frog hanging out on one of her pool chairs.  He looked so neat.   I love frogs.  I love how they’re slimy and mushy and how their skin is uneven …

Ribbit.

And of course, I’ve taken plenty of pictures of Tyger Lilly … most recently, this one …

Kitty in a Bag

She really likes reusable grocery bags, I’m not sure why … I guess if there was one my size I’d try and get in it too, who knows.

In other news, I still don’t know what I’ll be doing in the Fall.  I’ll keep you posted, don’t worry.  I know it’s just a talking point and that it’s the first thing that comes to mind when you see me or think of me,  ”Oh, what will Cynthia be doing for a real job?”  Ministry with Young Life?  Teaching?  I’m working on it, don’t worry.  Sorry for the rant.  I’ve been patient since February and I’m starting to get impatient as well.  I guess God is allowed to take his time …

Energy: Lack and Abundance

Where to start?  The past week has been incredibly busy.  Excuses, excuses, I know.  I discovered something about myself tonight.  It’s really draining to be around people all the time.  It’s draining to be around different people all the time.  My roommates, my boyfriend, and my immediate friends and YL teammates that I see often, excluded, it’s hard to be around either new people or different people more than once or twice a week.  It was hard for me to admit that to myself tonight.  I went to Bible study with my roommate, Claire, and I love all the people there, and I had a great time, but it took a lot out of me, after already having a draining week.  I went to Annapolis to see Hannah earlier in the week, another SMCM friend, Megan, was up this weekend, until this morning, and so on … it’s been hard this summer.  I don’t do well with change.

It was hardest to admit to myself that I don’t thrive in a large group of people, because what I’m going to be doing in the fall, Young Life, is all about spreading the gospel to as many as will listen.  This is done through personal relationships though, which is what I do consider to be my strength – one on one relationships and attempting to understand the complexities of one person at a time.  A group setting is too much for me sometimes.  Small doses.  Or maybe I need to train myself to “like” large groups and lots of people all the time …

So.  What happened to my 19 day challenge?  It has now become a daily life challenge.  I wasn’t incredibly realistic about what I would be able to do during the couple weeks that I set out to do the challenge in … in other words, I wasn’t fair to myself: there are so many things I want to do this summer and so many people that I want to “catch” up with and by being legalistic with my time, I’m not giving myself a chance to do those things.  So overall, the 19 day challenge was successful because it has allowed me to see that it’s OK to not “reach” my own expectations … it’s “OK” to fail … not because I can get up and try again, but because I’m not trying to perfect who I am, I’m trying to learn more about who I am, which I’ve done.

That probably doesn’t make any sense.  If you take nothing else away from this blog post, take the fact that I won’t be continuing the 19 day challenge.  Take the fact that I will continually try to be in the Word every day, exercise regularly, and work on reading a novel or work of non fiction.  Take the fact that I am OK with not being perfect.  I’m OK with everything not being on me.