Contentment

I had to post something because every time I open my blog, my last post stares me in the face and makes me sad. Something *different* has to take its place.

 I grew up in Bellevue. That, in itself, is baggage. No, not merely baggage...Prada baggage. Coach baggage. Brand name, bought-at-full-price-on-Daddy's-Visa baggage. And when I got married, there wasn't room for that kind of baggage in our apartment, so off it went to storage. And now that we're settled, and I have everything I could possibly want out of life, I'm going through the things that were in storage, dusting them off, and trying to see where they fit in this life we're building.

 And my baggage wants back in. And I'm struggling. I miss being able to go to Nordstrom whenever I had a whim, treating myself to a new shirt or pair of shoes or whatever. I miss the teenage self that would spend money like crazy at the mall and come home with BAGS and BAGS of stuff. She was unencumbered by the guilt inherent in the knowledge that the $12 lip gloss could have paid for a (tiny, tiny) fraction of her daughter's college education. She wasn't shackled by budgets. She didn't even know how to coupon. She was free.

 But oh, so expensive. Because she bought the baggage, and now I drag it with me everywhere I go. Will someone teach me how to take this fancy, leather bundle of discontentment to the dump? Or at least Goodwill? I want to be happy with what I have, and stop comparing myself to other people. I want to love my home, not constantly seek to transform it into some deranged Martha Stewart project gone wrong. I want to focus my energy on loving and serving my family, not impressing strangers. 

How do you spring clean your heart in the summer of your life?

Inspiration

I recently read The Book Thief by Markus Zusak. It moved me in so many ways: to laughter, to tears, to compassion, to empathy, to rage, to disgust, to deep, deep conviction, to love, to breathe, to write. The book was poetry and perspective, surface tension and darkness of depth. The book was my past in blood and my past in faith and my hope in future. It spoke of me, and played out dissonance I couldn't begin to articulate. What a moment of brilliance.

I miss writing. I miss it like I miss my father, with a dull ache that occasionally rises to an unbearable sharpness caught in the throat. I miss the inadequacy of words, the fumbling that miraculously results in beauty and brilliance. I miss the desperation, the drive to express what language can only stretch its fingers towards before it inevitably falls short.

This time of year is sharp, unceasingly on the edge of paranoia, seeing him in everything with a pain that the rest of the year is joyous nostalgia. This time of year is no more brownies with pecans, or horses in giftboxes, or grandchildren. It hurts, but hurts is not the word. Burns, tugs, weeps, regrets, longs, hopes beyond hope. What can you say, with words? You can't say tears, but you have to try. 186 years would still have been too short. Love you, Daddy.