EVERYDAY HAPPINESS

An acquaintance of mine recently posted the following query on Facebook: "What are some normal, everyday things that really epitomize happiness/love to you?"

I started thinking about this and commenting some of my things, and man, I just couldn't stop. I love this question so much. Here are a few of the everyday things that I feel denote happiness.

- hot fries
- leaning up against someone while we're covered in blankets having watched several hours of movies/tv
- buying food for someone else
- "human" by the killers
- singing with my sister
- phone calls that are over an hour long
- the prospekt's march edition of Coldplay's "viva la vida" album
- listening to music with windows down while sitting in the passenger seat of a car
- sending compliments to a friend
- CAMPING
- long car rides
- that moment when you're planning a paper and SUDDENLY ALL YOUR IDEAS COME TOGETHER AND YOU COULD WRITE FORTY PAGES ON IT I LOVE THAT MOMENT
- autumn leaves/the sky/trees/mountains/clouds/being outside/going on walks when it's just barely chilly
- card games
- snuggling/falling asleep with little brothers

- late night talks when the car is parked in front of the house

- reading a book in one sitting
- waking up to fresh snow
- sleepy laughter
- underlining sentences while reading/notes in the margins
- libraries
- opening a new bag of chips
- Christmas lights
- the resonant sound of beautiful music from a string instrument

What does happiness look like to you?

this month I loved // november 2016

November was a strange month. I have a lot of mixed feelings about how it went down. But here are some very beautiful things that were a part of it.

- I'm really loving Humans of New York right now?? It shows such a variety of different people and opinions. I love the exposure it provides to different perspectives, the reminder to be compassionate. It's not about sharing a political viewpoint that Brandon agrees with -- it's about people and their stories. we're all human. BASICALLY I JUST REALLY LOVE IT RIGHT NOW.

- this article. I just love it so much. sometimes I get angry at myself for being queer, buying into the idea that I'm making the world a worse place. This article gives me hope, and reminds me that I am not cut off from becoming more like Christ. It describes beautiful, beautiful love. Just read it.

- I MADE PECAN PIE. I HAVE NEVER MADE PIE BEFORE. IT WAS DELICIOUS. I AM SO PROUD OF IT.

- this TED talk. I love it so much. I love the focus on queer kids, what we learn about this woman's work. It's something I want to do someday. I love the nuance she acknowledges in that intersection of queerness and religion. I identify so much with the experiences she shares. Religion feels more like home when you watch a queer woman talk about her identity and her faith. It helps me find God.

- That TED talk also helped bring me to the realization that there is literally nothing stopping me from studying Greek and Hebrew and reading the Bible in its original languages, becoming a Biblican scholar and theologian. And honestly, that realization probably changed my life. In the church I was raised in, it's incredibly uncommon to engage with scripture on the level I want -- especially if you're a woman or assigned female at birth. It never even occurred to me that that was a possibility. This month I realized that I can engage with scripture. I can be a full participant in Christ's church. And I'm willing to bet that realization will change my life.

- this TED talk. It's one I've watched or listened to many, many times. But every time I remember it exists, I have to spend some time with it again. This month I listened to it on a night last week as I fell asleep after a very difficult day. It made me cry, not for the first time. I mean, when Jon stARTS SINGING TERMINAL? It breaks and mends my heart every time. I just love this talk a lot.

- the first real snowfall this month happened on a day I was working. it was wonderful to keep walking by the doors up front and see how beautiful and drifting and blizzardy it was. it was lovely.

- Maggie Stiefvater shared a beautiful transcript of her keynote at a conference, and wow. you need to read it immediately. These are ideas that are so, so important to me. They really shape how I live my life and the person I'm trying to become, and I kind of think everyone should read this.

- The secondary characters in my NaNoWriMo novel really shone this month. They were leaping off the page almost immediately, which was nice because I started November 1st with a grand total of two unnamed characters. Let me quickly introduce the secondary characters who showed up.
Rivva is my strategic commander of the first division of troops to reach the plains where the war takes place. She's hard, inflexible, with incredibly high standards, but she also takes time to interact with every soldier she can individually. She's a fantastic leader and I love her.
Gyen is her second in command. She's going through some major changes right now, but she starts out seeming very shifty, aloof, and self-important. And she is, but she's also committed and open to new ideas and she isn't satisfied with just accepting what she sees on the surface, if that makes sense. I'm really pleased with how she's turning out.
I've also got Gertel. She's young, maybe fourteen, quiet and solemn. Not someone you find easy to connect with. But she's got this wry sense of humor that takes you by surprise, and you'll find she's warm and passionate, once you get to know her.

- I've also been s l o w l y reading The Two Towers this month, a few paragraphs or pages at a time. This bit at the battle of Helm's Deep resonated with me unexpectedly. Everything is grim, and the Orcs are easily destroying them, but for a moment during the battle Aragorn pauses to look out into the sky and take courage and resolve from the coming dawn.

- "Everything I Know" from In The Heights. Mandy Gonzalez has a gorgeous voice, and I love everything about this song. But don't listen to it unless you've listened to the songs preceding it! There are too many spoilers, and you won't appreciate it as much without the background.

- A dear friend of mine and I spent a few hours writing together early in the month while she was down from college for the weekend. It was wonderful. There's just an energy and a focus in writing near someone else that I don't get when writing alone. It helps that Mari is incredible. 

- I finally watched season 3 of Carmilla this month. WOW. I loved the ideas they explored, the mood of the season, Carmilla's character development, the shipping, everything about LaFontaine. All in all, definitely the best season. 

- the Little Women soundtrack by Thomas Newman is gorgeous and I can't stop listening to it. 

- I finally started reading Man's Search for Meaning this month. I've been meaning to read it since forever, and it's been so good. The idea of meaning driving you forward is a conclusion I came to after struggling with depression for months, and Viktor Frankl articulates these thoughts so perfectly. A few highlights: 

He describes how he and his fellow prisoners in concentration camps grew to glorify the mundane experiences of their old lives. Frankl says, "In my mind I took bus rides, unlocked the front door of my apartment, answered my telephone, switched on the electric lights. Our thoughts often centered on such details, and these memories could move one to tears."

It's so hard to choose a few lines from passages that are life-changing, but this sentence sums up some of the major ideas very well: "Everywhere man is confronted with fate, with the chance of achieving something through his own suffering."

Frankl rejects the idea of "the meaning of life" as something general, vague, a single idea that encompasses everyone. Instead, he says that it "differ[s] from man to man, and from moment to moment." Everything he says about this resonates with me so deeply. We create, find, shape our own meaning for our lives. 

Another quote, this one about how our lives are not defined only by their potential for meaning in the future. Frankl says, "Not only our experiences, but all we have done, whatever great thoughts we may have had, and all we have suffered, all this is not lost, though it is past; we have brought it into being. Having been is also a kind of being, and perhaps the surest kind."

Basically, I love this book. You should read it. 

- Finally, I discovered some art by Douglas Blanchard this month that depicts Jesus Christ as a contemporary gay man during the final days of his ministry. I'm not sure there are words to describe how important this is. It's incredibly powerful. I found myself tearing up at this painting. Give the rest of them a look. (Warning, though, that a couple of the paintings contain some violence. Be prepared for that.)

"Jesus Before the People" by Douglas Blanchard

it begins now

it's so easy to get caught up in pettiness. especially since i'm not in school right now, i easily spend entire days browsing social media and berating myself for doing nothing of value. and even when i begin to step up and envision or plan for something that matters, it often turns into the overwhelming feeling that i will never accomplish anything significant.

today i chatted with a friend about my plans for nanowrimo. i got excited about several different projects i wanted to write, and, like the intellectual giants that we are, we discussed them in all caps. eventually i came to something of a conclusion about which book i wanted to write and the necessary preparation.

with almost a month until nano (and no plot), i faced the option of either working on the middle-grade novella that i told myself i would write in october (.........because that's going really well, and by really well i mean it isn't going at all), or exploring my ideas for the potential nanowrimo book. so of course i ended up shaking, overwhelmed by the urgency of writing something worthwhile, something significant, something that wouldn't easily fade into obscurity, unnoticed and immaterial. even now, it terrifies me: this feeling that i have to hurry, i have to write something learn something teach something say something do something there is no time, the world is here and waiting for me to matter and as yet i have done nothing important.

well, aside from the fact that i have done important things, i cannot do everything right now. i cannot hold out my hand and magically produce a well-written, nuanced, meaningful novel in the space of three seconds. i cannot learn to paint and create a masterpiece to dwell in a home or museum, shaping people's moments, by the time i sleep tonight. i cannot grow a tall, vibrant tree before my siblings get home from school.

because trees & the sky, man

but i can plant the seed.

i can write a sentence, a paragraph, a page, however inconsequential those words are now. i can go inside and search the house until i find a twisted plastic paintbrush and something to be my color. i can take a deep breath. i can step outside and see mountains and flowers and trees and clouds in the sky and grass and warm-colored leaves. i can put my fingers to the keyboard and try to capture my fears on this page, despite the terrifying feeling that what i have to say can never be pinned down into words others can understand.

someday i will be able to speak what i feel clearly and find words that will hold my thoughts. i dream of changing people's worlds, of speaking and writing exactly what someone needs to hear. i want to stand before large crowds and offer words alive with significance. someday i may open a nonprofit for religious and/or mentally ill lgbtqiap youth, or teach college students the joys of literature. i want to hear hundreds of people's stories. i want to bring light to tired eyes. it hurts that i cannot accomplish these things today.

but the only way to accomplish them is by beginning. now. in this moment, where the air is cold and snow has dusted the tops of the mountains and scattered dandelions disperse their seeds and i sit on my porch, cross-legged. it is true -- meaning and significance and changing the world are not things that can wait. but these trees take years to grow, and they start now, in the smallest of moments.