Thirty, Flirty and Fabulous

So I’m turning 30 in two months and it makes me FTFO (that’s freak the F*&($ out, for those who don’t know), so much so that I kind of, maybe, developed a bit of an anxiety disorder because of it. I don’t know why, maybe I do but that is a different post. Today’s post is about turning 30 and being Single. Man that’s hard. I don’t have a Significant Other to tell me I still look as great as I did at 25 or whatever husbands say when their wives are FTFOing about getting older. I can’t check that box off. That box that says I should have children by now. Nope that one is still empty too, but whatever. Who cares? I CARE, but again not what this post is about. This post is about how apparently no one takes pictures of single people. What in THE WORLD is that about?! I’m single so that means I can’t have professional photos done? Go ahead, take a break from this post, pull up Google and type in photographer or lifestyle photographer or portrait photographer in your browser. Go ahead. I’ll wait…..

What did you find? I can tell you, a grand list of people who specialize in wedding and family photography. There is also something called lifestyle photography (which I LOOOVE) but in this case usually means FAMILY session in your house. What is the deal with that? Why is everyone so against celebrating single people? I’m over here attempting to manage my anxiety by over the top celebrating my 30^th and I can’t find one photographer in my area that makes me feel like I’m not weird for wanting a photo session on my “big day”. Sure some of them do “senior” portraits but I’m not a senior. I’m not looking to recapture my high school days (raise both hands if you too are excited about not being a teenager anymore). They do “head shots” but that isn't going to cut it either, I’m not a budding starlet. Boudoir? And do what with it? Make guest in my home uncomfortable? I want a session with my family and friends. A session that can celebrate ME! The person I am at 30 and the people that I love at 30. I can’t be the only one interested in this?!

Now, I LOVE photography, I’m over the moon about it so much so that even though my sister is a marvelous painter and I love traditional paint & canvas art I have very little of it in my house. I want every space in my home covered with photos. Apparently this is odd because I’m single. When I bought my first home I had the following conversation with my BF:

BF: What are you going to put on that big wall over there? (I LITERALLY have a wall that is SIXTEEN FEET LONG in my living room. No windows, just one long piece of sheet-rock.)

Me: Oh, (very excited) I’m going to do a giant picture wall!

BF: Oh, (confused look) whose picture are you going to hang on it.

Me: Mine.

BF: Umm, won’t that be weird?

Me: Well, whose picture do you have hanging in your house?

BF: oh, well yea, that’s a good point.

     Dang right it’s a good point. I’m not weird because I don’t have a diamond on my left hand (it is your left hand right? I can never remember) or children running under foot. I’m allowed to celebrate my life through the fine art of photography. There are pictures me and my sister, me and my friends, and my mom and dad. Most of them have me in them. Some of them don’t. Some of them have just me. Up close. Personal. Wonderful. To misquote scripture, and it was good. Still is. I really need the modern world to catch up with this new target market. Singles from their mid-twenties on are no longer the  marmish, cat ladies from my beloved black and white films. I’m kind of normal. People are waiting longer and getting older before settling down and tying the knot. Good for you. Wait it out, be single, be in a relationship and be single again. You aren't strange for doing this. You also aren't strange for wanting a photo session to celebrate a milestone in your life (she whispers on repeat to herself). I’m not really sure how I am going to start this revolution. Maybe I’ll create a hashtag, #celebratesingleness. (For some reason that one sounds depressing.) What I do know is that we need to start doing it more. All of us single people AND all you non-single people. Start appreciating your single friends more. Stop expecting them to show up or help plan all your engagement parties, wedding showers, weddings, baby showers, anniversaries and birthday parties with gifts galore without EVER returning the favor. Plan a birthday party FOR them, send them flowers (because it’s their birthday or just because), call at the end of the week and see if they need to blow off some steam. We don’t have someone built in to do those things for us. We often have to find it when we need it or go without because we just feel a little to raw too make that phone call for ourselves.

Before anyone freaks out I’m not asking my friends to take the place of a significant other. Don’t try that. It would probably be weird if you did. I am saying, share the love. Acknowledge that being single is HARD and do something nice for your single friends just to remind them that they aren't doing this life alone. It’s really easy to feel that way when you lay down at night alone in bed, even if you do have a wonderful family and great friends just a phone call away. And single-people, celebrate yourself DAGGUMIT! Throw over the top celebrations for that promotion, TELL your friends to take you out for that occasion big or small. Make your friends dress up to take professional pictures with you. They are the family you CHOOSE to have in your life. In the wise words of the Rolling stones, you can't always get what you want. But if you try, sometimes you can get what you need. We can’t get what we need if we don’t ask for it, and that goes for everybody.

*Pictures done by Emily Lapish Photography. My wonderful photographer who moved evern FARTHER away from me. Sending me on this maddening search for someone closer. But Seriously guys. Use her. 

Cinderella's Castle

Above my bed hangs a picture of a beautiful castle all set aglow. The castle itself is white with blue towers spiraling towards a perfectly midnight blue, star filled sky complete with a glowing full white moon. The castle even has it’s own moat complete with crocodiles to guard against unwanted intruders when the gate is drawn. The castle is a dream and is in many ways the focal point of the picture. It takes up over half of the scene and is clearly the object of desire, but what intrigues me, what really gets me excited is the small round coach off to the side. It is pulled by four glorious white horses racing towards the castle entrance. It is of course Cinderella. Though you can’t see the girl herself your heart knows she is there and she is why I love this picture. It makes me want to swoon. It makes me want to dream. If Cinderella were a true story I imagine her night at the ball would have looked much like this photo. Everything is perfectly set, a night clear and beautiful, a castle towering and somehow graceful, and a prince waiting for a chance at love but woefully disappointed again and again and again. I still want to be the girl in that coach. I still want to be Cinderella whisked away to the ball.

The picture hanging above my bed is simply the beginning of the tale. A long story is soon to follow full of glass slippers, dashed dreams, heart breaks, a long search and of course the happily ever after. Cinderella’s story isn’t unique. She isn’t the first blushing beauty searching for true love. She isn’t the first to be disappointed and she isn’t the first to be rescued by prince charming. I think most girls do themselves a disservice when they tell their story. They imagine themselves as no Cinderella. They imagine that their lives are much more mundane but I don’t think this is true. A romance is always a magical thing if only for one reason, it reminds me of the King that searches for my heart. He will search the ends of the earth with the glass slipper looking for me. He will forge into the darkest wood to deliver the kiss that saves me from death. He loves my heart, he desires my soul and I think the whole of the world feels the pull of his love. I believe our love stories weave and overlap not because we are mundane creatures unable to find new material but because our hearts long to tell their own tale. I believe our souls long to tell the whole world that a great romance is taking place every day. There is a prince that longs to know you, a King who hopes for your love and will reach to the ends of the earth to gain it. Romance is no simple thing. It’s a beautiful, hope filled thing that springs new every morning, full of grace and promise. Books remind us of this romance and they make my heart race in desperate anticipation for the day I won’t have to wait anymore. Until that day I will keep reading and I hope you will do the same!

Crown of Creation

It is a rather valid argument that women are among the most frequently marginalized group both today and in history. A creation that God Himself deemed His crowning achievement constantly told they are less than. Not good enough, not strong enough, not smart enough. The crown of creation, the jewel of it all constantly beaten, broken, and pushed down. We forget who we were created to be. Eve herself carried this guilt and shame with her from the garden. After all isn’t she the crack in the perfect plan of creation, the weakest link? Like Eve we believe we were not good enough. We believe we failed and we should be placed on the back row, in the background where we are no good to anyone not even ourselves. It’s better to do nothing than to do more harm right? 

It sounds hopeless right. That's how it’s supposed to sound to us. Hopeless. However, there is another character at play here. He was there at the dawn of creation. He watched the oceans take their shape. He watched the birds take to the wind and sing their first song and he was there when Eve was tempted. He has been around for years and centuries, for lifetimes and generations. He has had time to perfect his art. What is his art exactly? What is his hope and his purpose? It is a one-minded desire. He must only make us believe it all. To set us down and convince us that is where we should be, sitting in the back, hidden. For lifetimes he has worked to find the frayed parts of our lives, the places where the tapestry of our lives was pulled, torn and cut apart from our eternal purpose, from our Creator, the Lover of our soul. He has pulled on the threads and watched how we dance. How can we hope to fight against such an enemy? How can we hope to get free. Why not just sit down? Why not just give in? Perhaps that isn't all.

Even though our enemy has taken the long years of his life to perfect his craft. Even though my twenty-eight years of life in my own flesh and blood can't begin to compare to his knowledge of my human condition. I have a Champion who knows even more. Not only did my Champion knit me together, not only did He create the tapestry of my life, He created the tapestry of my enemy’s life. He understands his edges and the places where he has been torn apart. He created those edges and those boundaries. Sometimes I allow the voice of my enemy to get to loud for my ears. Sometimes I let his face get so close I can't see the expanse beyond. But that doesn't matter, because my Champion understands my heart. He not only sees the tapestry of my life He understands it intimately. He know the color of each thin thread of my life. He chose each shade and the depth of the saturation of each hue. He gets me. That's the easiest way to say it. He gets me so deeply that it feels He knows my choice and my decisions before I even consider them, and maybe He does. He anticipates me like a well-choreographed dance. He moves and pulls me so closely to my own movement that in some ways I can't even see the movements. I can't understand that I am dancing and I certainly don't understand the purpose of each twirl and spin. But even that is okay. Even when I feel my enemy has pushed me down into the muck of life. Even when I don’t feel I am anything close to the crown of creation but more akin to something stuck to the bottom of a shoe. My champion looks at me and He laughs. He reminds me that what I feel is not Truth that my emotions do not really reflect who I am and all the while He dances with me.

He swings me to the rhythm of a song that He hums sweetly in my ear. All I need to do is close my eyes and listen. Some days that song is loud like the pulsing music of a nightclub. But sometimes it's like a whisper, like the barely audible buzzing of a honeybee. I have to listen hard and even when I hear it I doubt it's truth, it's relevance, and its reality. Some days it seems like I am simply talking to myself, trying to convince myself that it’s all-true. On those days I have to believe that I truly am dancing, a beautiful pattern all my own, that I wear a gown clean and glowing. The fit is perfect and the room is stilled as all of creation stands to watch my Champion dance with me. The room is silent as it witnesses my Champion love me even when I cannot love him back. They are in awe of His passion for me and the beauty of His dance.

That is what it means to be the crown if creation. Not that I'm perfect or eloquent or so unbelievably beautiful that birds stop their song and the wind hurries to brush my hair. No, that isn’t it at all. It's that my Creator sees such beauty in me that He is utterly struck. He takes me in His arms and even when I'm not sure I know how to dance, on days when it feels that I don’t love Him and I turn to walk away, He pulls me close and He hums in my ear the song of my heart, the song of my life, the song of His Love for me. That's what being the crown of creation means. That creation is in awe of the love He has for me, for you. 

Growing Old

It has occurred to me that growing old is fascinating. 

It does not happen in one smooth row. 

Instead in jerks tugs pulls throws.

One hardly sees coming.

One day I feel 16 the next 23. 

Today I am 18, next year 59. 

I find growing old fascinating.

A strange and wonderful thing, 

This nothing ever stays the same. 

Yet nothing ever has a change. 

The earth spins. 

The moon pulls. 

We all grow old. 

I find growing old fascinating. 

Like a tangled ball of yarn

it slowly unravels. 

Like a labyrinth of hedges

Grown tall and old. 

The further you delve in the farther you have to go. 

This growing old never has an end. 

I find growing old fascinating 

Because of all that I did not know.

I was created to know a Creator. 

Little did I know I also must know myself. 

I am the Labyrinth. 

I am the ball of yarn. 

I spin and pull and tug and throw. 

I find growing old fascinating 

So Sorry.

I keep looking at the Christmas presents under my tree and I keep wondering what they will do with theirs, those parents’ whose children died yesterday. I think about their houses all trussed up and decorated into a wintry fairyland. I keep thinking about the reminder it must be. Presents wrapped, stockings stuffed and gifts hidden in closets waiting for Santa to show. I can’t help but feel that I would just throw everything out. You see I live on top of this gloriously annoying hill that sits at about a 45-degree angle. It’s difficult to navigate some days but on this day I feel that I would be thankful for that. I would simply throw the tree down the front steps and watch it crunch and tumble it’s way to the street. The nativity, the angels, the little ceramic houses built into a white fairy tale Christmas that we never see in this warm weather. Then the presents would go. One by one. What else would I do with them? I couldn’t return them. I would feel as though I was betraying my sweet little one, getting money back for the gifts I so carefully planned out. The gifts they have squealed and begged for since July. MAYBE, just MAYBE I could give them away but I’m not sure I could pull myself together enough to take them anywhere. To pack them into my car, to drive somewhere or even to think about other sweet little faces that I don’t know opening presents that were for my little boy. And that Elf, that stupid elf that I moved around my house. Carefully planning what mischief he would be in tonight. I might cut him to pieces. I might burn him in a woodpile. But I know I would hate him.

Then I think some more and I wonder if I would even be out of bed yet. It is possible that I would simply curse anyone who peaked their head into my bedroom door. I would lay in bed demanding that the world stop spinning. That the world stops moving on. I would swing between a white hot anger that burned into my throat from the depth of my belly to simple cold, gracefully numbing, empty despair. I would squeeze my eyes shut so tightly dots would appear when I opened them. I would beg my tears exhaust me so I can sleep back into blissfully peaceful nothing sleep.

Perhaps my husband, my mother, my sister would pull from bed. Maybe they could steer me through today. The details that I have always cursed because I have always hated details. But these details I would curse and hate even more. These details would have everything to do with putting that little body that I grew inside of me, that I kissed, nursed, healed, groomed, cleaned, and tried to squeeze every last ounce of warm dirty child smell from, away from me forever. I couldn’t say bury. I don’t know that I could make any of those details. Flowers, music, dates, times, newspaper announcements, handouts, pastors, prayers, caskets, locations, churches, outfits. It simply makes my stomach turn. It makes me want to throw up. It makes me want to crawl back into bed. No. Just no.

A hundred scenes run through my head. A hundred possible reactions. A million ways to get through it, or not. All I am certain of sitting in my living room a thousand miles away from this shooting is there is little to nothing I can do for these families. I want to hug them. I want to make them hot tea and tell them it is okay to stay in bed today. And tomorrow. It’s okay if you want to throw everything away. No you aren’t crazy for feeling that way. Be angry, be ragefully so. Let the heat in your neck reach up and tingle your ears, let it clench your fist, let it take over your voice and just scream until you can’t anymore. Tell God you can’t believe Him. Can’t believe that he would betray you in such a way. That’s okay too. Even he understands. He understands much better than I do or I can. He gave you the ability to feel all of those things so you can react. So you can get through. I don’t know what I would do even if I sit and imagine for hours.

I don’t know half of how I would feel or half of what I would do. I do know that I am so incredibly sorry. That my heart twists in my chest, my eyes burn, my mind screams and I hate this world when I think about those families. I wish I could pack away their Christmas trees. Pull down their lights. Put their houses back to right, back to normal. I wish I could cook and clean for them. I wish I could make the world stop turning. That new televisions shows wouldn’t air, new news stories wouldn’t surface because everything stopped for them. It hasn’t. It won’t. But I wish for just a day or two it would. That people would forget about their arguments about gun control, mental health, broken systems, broken people, and a broken world because today it doesn’t matter. It doesn’t help. It doesn’t stop what has already happened. Today I would just want to be left alone. I would want the world to forget about me because I want to forget about it. I just want to feel, to get lost, to disappear, to die, to waste away. To just sleep because that’s the only place I can pretend that yesterday didn’t happen.

I’m sorry that I can’t help. That I can’t make it better. I’m just so so sorry.

Run

Was it enough? She had given everything. The alley was empty, save the one girl slouched against the cold stone wall. Her breathe came in quick pants as she knotted her fingers together. Her brow was knitted tight as the day she was born. Nadia often found her days ending like this. The sore ache creeping up into her stomach clenching it tight beneath her ribs, the breath would catch and her heart would race then she would ask the same question; was it enough? She found her life had become a rapid succession of disappointments and failures. She was bright enough to be considered witty, attractive enough to be considered pretty and healthy enough to appear to be worth the fight, but still she wondered. Her breaths became deeper, the thump of her heart eased its rabbit like rhythm but she still worried with the ring on her left hand. Would he still chase her?


She pushed up and slapped a flat palm against the stone wall. Another cool august evening, another fit of fear, another fight. He wouldn’t find her this time, she was sure of it. She ran farther than before, pushed harder than before. Her mind ran through the argument, tugging at the corner of each cruel word. Liar. Thief. Disappointment. Pulling it apart like an old brown sweater. Unraveling the meaning she intended behind each jab. Her stomach began to churn again, her muscles spasmed; she was on her knees before she could catch herself. Tears should be next she thought, but none came. Her eyes remained dry, too dry. She pushed her fist against them as hard as she could, letting the pressure push against her brain but no tears came. She clenched her teeth, throat tight, chest expanding and her skin became hot to the touch as she pushed herself off the dirty ground.

Why wasn’t he here? Why hadn’t he come? He swore he loved her. Said he would never leave, but he lied like all the others. Words slammed around inside her head, words sweet and dripping with honey. She tore each one apart; they weren’t worth the memory or the involuntary flutter in her gut. Invisible scenes rolled before her eyes, a broken pot, a tender kiss, a laugh, a lie, his smile, warm eyes, and kind face. With each image her body tightened, jaw clenched, nails biting into her palms as the anger pushed and flowed down to her toes. She succeeded. For hours she stood in the alley. Hours, but she was still alone. She closed her eyes and flexed her jaw. It was over. He swore he was different, she proved him wrong. Shaking her shoulders loose she smiled, it made her sick.

Fine, no smiling she thought. She was proud of herself; at least she thought she was. This is what she intended right, for him to leave her alone? To prove they were all the same fickle, selfish, half-hearted lovers. Why would a King be any different, he was after all just a man? In fact she convinced herself that he would be worse. As King he could have any and all he wanted. She was proud of herself. She proved a King a liar.

Then why did her stomach still churn? If this is what she wanted, why did it feel as though her heart was trying to dig its way out through her back? There was no fight left. She was alone again. She looked at her feet, where the sun slanted across the building throwing her into shadow. She counted in her head 1… 2… 3… and pushed one foot forward into the light. Another command and her foot moved again. One step at a time she forced herself into the street, back into the steady stream of people. She let her mind go numb, let the people push, bump and shove her forward, each step pushing her farther from him.

She closed her eyes and moved with the crowd no longer concerned with her direction or her purpose. A numbness sank through her bones, she felt heavy and pushed against the earth. Then a tingle moved through her wrist. She felt the warmth trace her palm and fingers lace through hers. Her heart raced, eyes flipping open like a switch. Her mind stuttered like a cold diesel engine, refusing to catch on a word, an image, a motion. All she could do was stare at the hand laced with hers. She felt her nose flare, her mouth water and her eyesight blurr. Soft fingers found her chin and moved her head for her forcing her to face soft brown eyes. Her mind emptied, her heart stopped. There was no sound, no feeling, no thought and no motion until he tilted his head and smiled. He leaned forward slowly, brushing the hair away from her ear with his nose. His voice was like warm honey “I found you. I told you, I always would, and I always will.” Nadia’s fingers clenched around his hand as she collapsed against his chest, he found her. Again. A single tear, warm and blue slipped from the corner of her eye, burying itself in his shirt. She wasn't alone after all.

To be a Princess

Imagine yourself in a time that has long since passed us. A time when your feet took you everywhere you needed to go, unless you were fortunate enough to own a horse. It’s a time we like to read about, dream about, watch movies about. A time we generally romanticize filled with valiant men and beautiful princesses. This is the world that occupied my dreams last night.

My dream began in the middle of a journey, as dreams tend to do. I was sitting on the back of a horse searching for something precious. I don’t know what this thing is or where I would find it, I only knew that it was important and must be found. The details become fuzzy because my wakeful mind is less inclined to remember the details of my dreams. I know I was not alone but I can tell you nothing of my companions. We found the object that we searched for and quickly attained it. In my dream this object seemed odd and anything but precious. It was a white grey disk about the size of my palm. It reminded me of an oversized coin though it was smooth and void of markings. Nothing about it seemed precious, important or worth any risk of danger but it hummed with significance. With every good story the battle was far from over; our journey was only half over. The new battle was to return to safety, return the object to it’s rightful place; this is where my dream begins to weigh heavily on my conscious.

Whomever we plundered the item from chased us back to a vast city. Our destination lay in the courtyard of the city. We raced our way through tight city streets; pushing through tight crowds and finally surrendering our horses to the chaos, ran on foot. I broke through the crowd and there stood the monument. It was a landing made of white cobblestone and a monolith like a chimney rose from the opposite side of the circle, a shallow clear pool of water surrounded the whole structure. When we arrived the city center was crowded but our pursuers where close behind. Here my dream becomes clear and muddy all at once. I remember stumbling towards the structure, losing my footing and tumbling to the ground watching the disk flip in the air landing softly into the clear water. Everything seems to go silent, no one moved, no one spoke and the water began to glow. Slowly a crown fit for a princess began to lift out of the water. It appeared to be made of clear cool ice, it had no color and the wavy appearance clear water takes on as it freezes. The crown was accompanied by what appeared to be the white, icy outline of a flower, an origami anomaly. As the crown settled itself down in the center of the cobblestone, tears filled my eyes and my heart swelled. Again I knew something someone never told me, this crown was for me and it was from my King. I lurched forward my view blurry and my steps uncertain as I waded through the water and knelt before the crown. It was too small for my head and certainly would never fit properly but this was not a thought in my dream only a conscious realization as I woke. Without hesitation I lifted the small princess crown and marveled at its simplicity, its clear solid touch. As tears fell down my face I began to sing to my King, the words I don’t remember, but I sang of love that ran deep and lasted forever as I placed the crown on my own head. It slowly stretched and grew to fit comfortably and perfectly on my head. There were whispers and stirring in the crowd but I was only aware of two people.

The first was a man standing outside the pool of water; he is standing in front of me and to my right. Delight dances across his bearded face. I have seen him before in my dreams and always the details of his face are obscured in my wakefulness. He is always calm and still. Love seems to dance about in his presence and there is always joy when he is around. I know it is for him that I cry and sing. I know that the crown is a gift from him. Then my mother is standing behind me and to my left and though the crowd is full of commotion I hear her voice clearly as the crown settles upon my head. Though she stands far away her voice sounds like a whisper in my ear “You know something of being a princess don’t you Katie.”