Firsts

I look back at my childhood and sometimes wonder when my mom stopped keeping record of my firsts. My first steps, my first words, my first time using the potty. Dates and details.

I feel like she gave up too soon, leaving so much history undocumented for future generations to marvel over. Or maybe she didn’t always have the data from certain things going unwitnessed and unreported by yours truly.

Here mom, I’ve collected a few more for you to be proud of and cherish, so if you haven’t accidentally donated it to Goodwill or thrown it away with the rest of my things once stored at your house, add these to my baby book:

My first mailbox I ever took out with my car, November 15, 2006.

My first cigarette, October 4, 1996.

My first time staying out too late at a boy’s house on a school night and Dad, shirtless, ringing the doorbell waking up their entire house to have me GET IN THE CAR NOW instead of, you know, trying me on my cell first, February 4, 2003.

My first (and last) toilet-hugging hangover, Seis de Mayo, 2010.

My first time disappointing you by admitting to some things on my blog, today’s the day!

–

But more seriously: It’s a little strange isn’t it? The things that shame us into not wanting to remember? The things that we don’t share about our past because we’re afraid of what people might think now of who we were then? I guess that’s love, really, to not keep a record of wrongs.

Overpacking pays off when you realize you’re vacationing in a place that feels like home

I drove back to Roswell from Orlando today wearing my last pair of clean underwear. That’s somewhat significant, actually, because I had overpacked — double-fisted with giant suitcases, half of my shoes in their own bag, and three trips to the car kind of style. Turns out: Overpacking pays off when you realize you’re vacationing in a place that feels like home and can’t get yourself to leave every day for 5 days until you actually have no other option.

The plan was to go home for Christmas Eve-Eve and Christmas Eve. Check. And swing through Orlando on Christmas Day, hang for the next day, and drive home.

And, check?

Maybe I couldn’t get myself to drive home to Roswell, because I quickly started realizing that home felt a lot like a good pick-up hug from Kurt. (Note: I almost always remember just about every pick-up hug I ever get. I can tell you the last four in detail, for whatever reason.) Home felt a lot like giving Sheldon a ride back to Dave’s with me after church and him telling me what a beautiful person he thinks I am, followed by a serious-sounding offer to fly down from Canada and beat the hell out of anyone who treats me any differently. And it felt like continuing on in my recurring supporting role as the “laugher” in the awkward silences among groups after one of Sheldon’s terrible jokes. It’s a thing.

Home felt a lot like piling into Dave’s truck with coffee carafes and several other people I barely knew or had never met, to go downtown to “hang out and talk to homeless people.” When the uncomfortable feelings disappeared, home felt like the steps of Downtown Baptist, a notable spot where dozens of homeless folks in Orlando sleep at night. It felt like listening to stories from homeless men — the emotions they had, the hopelessness, and how they weren’t viewed or valued as being humans. I couldn’t help but hold their arms while they spoke, look into their eyes, shake their hands and tell them how privileged I was to have met them.

Home felt like not calling it a night and climbing up many, too many flights of stairs to a rooftop overlooking the City Beautiful. And while laying hands on my new friend Laura Leigh as we prayed her out of Christmas Day and into her birthday at midnight, that rooftop felt like home.

Home also felt a lot like Dave’s living room couch, and waking up to shirtless boys arm wrestling in the kitchen. And like Kurt making me scrambled eggs and watching an Arnold Schwarzenegger movie before he left for work. And like wearing shorts in December, painting my fingernails in a rocking chair on the sunlit porch overlooking Lake Holden. And it felt like eating lunch at Tijuana Flats with Jeannette and catching up with her about life. (And raving over my long lost queso, my favorite sauces and crushed ice — no T-flats in the ATL.)

Home felt like losing a heated game of Trivial Pursuit to Jeannette, the reigning champion, while sitting around Dave’s coffee table.

And man, did home feel like Credo, where I sat and worked during several different days. It felt like walking with Scott and Josh to get pizza down the street. Home felt like saying goodbyes while holding the hands of Marcela and Stephan who had made me chai lattes each day because I don’t really drink coffee. And like catching up with Jen and Pam over a bowl of vegan chili at Dandelion. And drinking a glass of wine around a backyard fire, sharing testimonies and struggles, and even hugging friends who two hours previous were just acquaintances. Home felt like standing in Pam’s living room celebrating the 8th day of Hanukkah.

Home was sitting with and feeling the unhappiness of a dear friend. The whole fact I was still even in town and stayed over late one night on a whim, somehow made room for conversations that needed to happen, and in that, the whole unplanned trip back to Orlando became apparently significant when I realized God had set up all these moments.

It felt like drinking beer at a bar on a Friday night and talking about past mistakes and fears and heartbreak and spiritual gifts and love and what relationships should hope to be like. And like walking around downtown people-watching the club-goers. And like climbing a giant tree hidden in a quiet corner a few blocks away from the parties.

Home even felt like running the cash register in a fireworks tent (despite being hit on by strangers who were waiting for me to walk by their cars in the parking lot). It felt like counting inventory with Brandon while reflecting on 2011, until we realized it was New Year’s when the neighborhood got loud, smokey and bright from the 1000s of fireworks we’d just sold.

Home even felt like sleeping with half my body hanging off Dave’s loveseat (8 guys and 1 Ginna in 1 house that night = Ginna on the loveseat). And various gentlemen gently grabbing my shoulder to wake me up just enough to say goodbye as they left the house early Sunday for work because I wouldn’t see them again before I left.

So I dressed in my last set of clean clothes, and exactly one tank of gas and 6 hours later, I was back home. And it’s taking me some time to call it that again. Home.

—

I wasn’t expecting Orlando to feel like home. It was my first trip back since I’ve moved, and I didn’t know I miss it. But so much good was had and felt this week. I felt an overwhelming sense of renewal and this longing to linger in Orlando for a while because of it.

It felt so good to be there, close to friends who know me so well, and who have lived life with me, including the ones who lived the boring parts with me. I don’t have friends who share the everydays with me here, yet. I miss the ones who’d bike across the city with me to dinner or kayak around a lake, and the ones who’d watch me fold laundry just so we’d have time to talk, or sit outside at night on our porches or backyards and drink beer when it’d cool off in the summer, or persuade me to stay up too late watching a movie.

It was good to feel a part of that community again, even for a little while. Being back in an old place with old friends, as this person I am now who feels like I’m continually being made newer and whole-er, was the perfect way to be reminded of how I am known and cared for and of how I am capable of being known and cared for well — and reminded of how far my newer self has come, in simply being better at loving people and better at being loved.

Am I a blonde or brunette? I just don’t know who I am anymore.

Been having a bit of an identity crisis over here lately, in case you didn’t know.

Sort of crept up on me.

Didn’t see it coming.

Am I a blonde or a brunette?

I was reunited with some — who I thought were good friends — and Theresa made a comment, “Oh look at all of us with our blonde hair. [pause] Except you, Ginna,” and gave me a playful push out of the hug fest we had been having. I stood there, wondering how I could make my hair be lighter again, like how it used to be, so I could be loved again by my blonde friends, who I had no idea were so exclusive.

And brunettes? I asked to be a part of the brunettes, and they wouldn’t take my application either.

“Just dye it” — I can hear you through the computer screen, you know. I kid. I don’t know, I’ve never dyed my hair before, OK. I’d kind of like to keep its innocence, and the corresponding financial savings of not having to pay for a cut AND color. Petty, I know. The hair thing is more of a surface level identity issue I’m working through. It’s almost funny.

It’s an ugly duckling stage I’ve discovered myself in but in more significantly felt ways.

People who know you, probably all know you a little differently. Depends on when they became a part of your life, depends on for how long, depends on how much they had the opportunity to see you involved in different things (or be part of those things with you), depends on how much they wanted to know you. And it depends on what you decided to share, or what you even believe to be true about yourself. For me, it’s always been hard for me to say I’m good at something. And if I manage to say it, I rarely believe myself in the way I feel or approach it. I can look back at examples.

Am I a musician? The identity breakdown about this happened post-high school. Looking at the facts: I took piano lessons for eight years. I taught myself guitar. I took violin lessons for a year. I was first chair of the second violins. I accompanied all the different chorus classes with my guitar sometimes, and most of the time sat in the center of the stage playing the grand piano at concerts. My name’s engraved on a “Most Valuable Chorus Member 2006″ plaque somewhere at my parents’ house. I was the female “Most Musical” superlative in the yearbook out of my graduating class of 400. Danielle and I were asked to lead music at our Baccalaureate. I led worship at a few different youth groups at the same time, sometimes. I scored well on AP Music Theory exams. I used to be able to listen to a piece of music twice and notate 4-part sheet music. I could stare at a 12 bars for 45 seconds and sing a melody in solfege without ever having heard it before. I thought maybe I’d pursue music in college but never thought I could.

Am I an artist? I love to draw and paint. To sit and sketch. To layout pages. To stay up all night finishing something creative. Two different art teachers on two different occasions pulled me aside to please ask me to continue on in their classes. “You really stand out. I can see you have a natural talent here I want to see you develop. You could go far with this.” I never signed up for more. A professor in a graphics class asked me to stay after a late night class to say, “You’ve done exceptional work in here. You know, I know people who are looking for interns to come in and even some entry-level stuff if you want; I would love to connect you.” I just nodded, but I never saw whatever it was she saw.

Am I a writer? Am I an editor? This is the one I most recently took on as my identity because that was the role I’ve been in. I did some journalism gigs, was an editor too, and I continued to use those skills as a freelance copywriter for a time. Then I was roped into the gig I’m a part of now, slowly.

And now I’m moving away from the role and responsibility of content editing and writing—to be more fully a project manager. But writing and editing, it was the one thing I ever embraced as my thing. My sweet spot. My wheelhouse. My degree. I took extra grammar classes because I wanted to know the in’s and out’s of sentence structure. I can tell you all about punctuation. I love etymology. I know the rules. I speak and teach about writing with a sense of authority and even a little confidence because it’s what I really know. It’s what I’ve believed I was good at for a while. So I’ve got a bit of separation anxiety going on. I’m not going to be doing that stuff anymore.

Inside and even outside of work, I’m not sure how people I meet see me. I’m not sure how to evaluate what I’m about or who I am. I need to be reminded, I guess. I guess that’s where I’m pretty needy (sorry, guys!). I have old friends and I know how they see me. This identity crisis may be my darkening hair, or have to do with art, music and writing, but I think not feeling known is the real culprit here. Shoot, maybe it’s realizing I don’t really know myself all that well after all.

Greetings from suburbian ATL

I spent Sunday night sitting on a dark porch, sipping hot chocolate, staring out at city lights, listening to new friends talk.

And that is the most emo-sounding thing I’ve written in months. (That’s not saying a lot considering the last 3,000 words I wrote were about health insurance.)

But I’m trying to figure out how to describe what it’s like living here so far when people ask.

What’s the opposite of déjà vu? — the feeling that what’s happening already happened. I guess the opposite is feeling like everything is new. So it’s sort of the opposite. The only part that doesn’t fit, is that I feel comfortable with the new. Things feel like they ought to be familiar despite their newness though, so maybe it’s not the opposite at all. Maybe I’m just growing accustomed to being new.

Is that a confusing thought?

Whatever. That’s the only way I can think to put it to words.

But man, I’m only 6 weeks in, and I am already loving living here more than I expected. I am loving working here more than I thought I could. And Mom, I thought I’d take the opportunity to let you know I eloped.

I am loving putting in a little effort to know other people. It just feels good. That’s all I’m saying. Maybe I should have scrapped the whole confusing opposite of déjà vu thing and just said, “It feels good.” Also, Mom, the married thing is a joke.

Redemption

To the depths of our souls, beneath everything that’s about us or outside us, the most meaningful (and I’ll wager—strongest) longing within each of us is for redemption. It’s what makes us love feel-good movies. A hero who saves. A lonely person who finds love. A dying man who gets forgiveness.

I think the way the human mind often works shows some deeper seeded need for healing and redemption than may make sense at the surface.

Many adults never realize how much they are stuck somewhere in their psyche, trying to fix what was messed up in their childhood. You know the situations where you wonder: “How could a person who grew up with an alcoholic father, marry an alcoholic?” “Why would an abuse victim find him/herself in abusive relationship after another?” “Do they enjoy being hurt?” It can be simpler, too. To have felt ignored, a child with emotionally unavailable parents — and finding yourself now an adult seeking after relationships with people who are unavailable to you.

Because what if you could make it right? If you could make that alcoholic person quit their ways, if the abuser would become gentle and kind toward you, if that uncommitted, distant person would just come around to appreciate and love you fully, whatever it was you thought was wrong about yourself — no longer wrong. These are a sort of lie, to immerse oneself in unhealthy relationships with unreal expectations, and they’re a set up for cyclical failure. These examples are of humans trying to solve their own issues in ways that don’t work, but I think the trying comes from the same place, the same longing.

We long for things to be right.

Ever since the fall, ever since people messed up, ever since, everything waits eagerly for this redemption.

War, divorce, abuse, corruption, selfishness, slavery, hate, injustice, apathy. If I think for any length of time, or read articles, or hear stories, I can feel the weight of those things till I’m heavy with a burden. And I long for peace, unity, compassion, giving, freedom, love, justice, for someone to care, for myself to care and to bring some of those beautiful things to all of the earth where it’s so needed.

We’re longing for redemption of self, of each other, of the world. And then enters Jesus.

“With the arrival of Jesus, the Messiah, that fateful dilemma is resolved. Those who enter into Christ’s being-here-for-us no longer have to live under a continuous, low-lying black cloud. A new power is in operation. The Spirit of life in Christ, like a strong wind, has magnificently cleared the air, freeing you from a fated lifetime of brutal tyranny at the hands of sin and death.

^3-4God went for the jugular when he sent his own Son. He didn’t deal with the problem as something remote and unimportant. In his Son, Jesus, he personally took on the human condition, entered the disordered mess of struggling humanity in order to set it right once and for all. ” Romans 8:1-3ish (MSG)

People are funny

When people don’t believe that people are funny, I get worried. Real worried. I can actually find almost everything to be a little funny. That’s why people I’m around often complain I make them self-conscious because they don’t know what I’m always laughing about, even when it’s not about them.

But if I examine every painful or unhappy, miserable moment in my life, I can trace it back to a person not thinking whatever thing happened/said was funny. And man, if I’m talking to someone and they don’t smile even once, I can’t even think about communicating, it throws me off so much.

My worry may come from the harsher truth that I hide behind humor sometimes, or maybe a lot. And when people don’t laugh, smile or even pretend to, I feel uncovered and exposed. So I guess, if you don’t want to see me naked, laugh. Caveat for you pervys out there: Not laughing does not constitute nakedness.

I’ve also perfected using humor to disarm a situation. Through practice and precision I’ve found it works great on my dad. Sounding a little angry at me, pops? Throw a little witty remark in there, a little sarcasm, mix it in with a little timing, and I break him into a smile. But when this method fails on other people who don’t find anything funny ever, I feel useless and defenseless. Please, laugh at me so I don’t feel stupid.

My grandmother’s writing her own obituary

Every single time I talk to my dad he brings up the fact that I have yet to write my grandmother’s obituary. This has been going on for months and months. You may be thinking, if she’s been dead for months, wouldn’t someone else have written it already? Don’t newspapers do those? And wouldn’t it be way past due at this point? Indeed, all of those things would seem plausible except one thing. My grandmother isn’t dead.

The last time I was home, my dad handed me a printout of a copy of my grandmother’s brother’s obituary to use as reference, and a copy of the obit-in-progress drafted up in my grandmother’s own handwriting. The first line of it reads “Elizabeth Morrison, 84 85?, was found dead ____ ____ ____ in her daughter’s home.”

Is this an obituary, Grandma, or a Mad Lib?

Elizabeth Morrison, formerly Elizabeth Kiddy, formerly Elizabeth Jones, was born in 1926. She’s outlived both her husbands, and she’s beat cancer one time already. This time she’s decided not to get treatment, and I get that. I do. Why spend the money or the time, or feeling sick and out of it when you don’t know exactly how much more time it’ll give you or if it will work.

What I don’t understand is why she’s so insistent on writing her own obituary. See, my dad pestering me about it, I’m not sure if that’s because my grandmother has requested it, or that he’s insisting I help her out to stop her from writing it herself. Either way I haven’t done it yet. My dad wants me to stop by, sit down with her and take notes for this thing. Any of you want to go with?

I already have facts though, if she wants facts. And I hate traditional obits. Just because I went to school for journalism doesn’t mean I want to write one. They’re often pretty formulaic strings of information that might be better in a bullet list as far as I’m concerned. I guess she’s just waiting it out now, sitting in Sarasota at my Aunt Beth’s house that used to be her house, drafting up a piece of paper that talks about her life after she’s gone.

When I’m done writing, I suppose I turn it in for my grandmother’s edit and approval…

Elizabeth Morrison died this morning when a riot broke out in the Haitian village she’s been living in for the past several months providing basic medical care to local patients.

or maybe —

Elizabeth Morrison, 85, is reading her own obituary right now. She might not like the fact that it’s in present tense or that her own granddaughter refuses to write one prematurely, but just imagine all the facts she’d have to change if she lived to be 86 or 87! Just because celebrities and other famous people have pre-written obituaries so news outlets can beat each other to the punch over content their audiences can gawk over immediately upon confirmation of death, doesn’t mean Elizabeth should. She’s still alive, and she can share things she wants to make sure her family remembers in other, more personal ways. So she shouldn’t worry about the newspaper clipping that will announce her death to her neighbors, or the thing that future generations will be confused by when they can’t get past the question, “What’s a newspaper?”

Have you ever heard of someone doing this before? Am I being heartless? What do you suggest? Seriously, I’m curious what you think.

Good.

Don’t you know how good you are?

What great things you were made for?

How much purpose you’ve been given?

In the beginning, death and war, hate and insecurity — not part of the plan. It was for life and peace, love and faith. A faith that doesn’t require doubt by definition. A love that doesn’t understand what hate even is. Peace that doesn’t necessitate the existence of war. Life that never has to end.

“Bad” wasn’t part of the equation.

You’re too hard on yourself, questioning everything, devaluing who you are. Labeling yourselves with lies and numbers, you’ve done so much to wound yourself and in turn one another whether in your words or your actions or your lack thereof — the things you didn’t say, the steps you didn’t take. You’ve been hurt, and so you’ve hurt. God didn’t stop creating when you started breaking. He wasn’t apathetic when your parents didn’t care. He didn’t curse you when you swore at him. He didn’t quit on you when you gave up. He hasn’t, and he’ll never.

He’s deeply moved at your sadness. He’s hurt when you’re hurt (and when you hurt others). He doesn’t leave you hopeless in your messes. He cries over death. So now what is there? What could possibly fix you? Well, I’ll tell you what. Death? That’s been defeated. Hate? His love is perfect. War? Peace above what you can understand. Tears? Washed away. Sin? Grace. Brokenness? Healing. New creation. And what did God say after his new creation? It is good.

He thinks you’re beautiful and capable of things you don’t even believe. He values who you are right now, and he thinks more highly of your potential than you do. What if you’re a Moses who’s going to challenge authorities despite your lack of skill? What if you’re a David who’s going to slay giants despite your size? What if you’re a you, able to do more than your own limits?

Can you imagine more than you can imagine?

You put so much effort into getting people to think good things about you. By stretching to fit into what you think others should see. By trying so hard to be something you want to be, quite possibly something you already are but don’t believe. Can you have quiet thoughts when you’re staring in the mirror? Do you ever look, admire and hear, “It is good”?

You are good.

Will my blog need therapy because of me?

One day, when my blog is able to type for itself, I have this new fear that it’ll sit me down to tell me I didn’t love it enough.

A little part of me wonders if certain things have made me a lazy and absent blogger.

Why don’t I blog as much as I used to? When I first started writing back in the day, did I just have a lot more to say? A lot more time? Was I just funnier and not as good looking? Because I think I had less time actually. Perhaps I was doing so much that I had a lot more to write about. But I don’t think that’s all really the case.

Maybe when I realized people like my mom and brothers and uncles and professors and roommates and bosses and friends and ex-lovers (that last one’s a joke if you’re one of the strangers who reads this blog) and strangers could read anything I wrote, that I got a little keyboard-shy.

Sometimes I think some crazy things, I think. And I don’t know if I can censor myself and write PC enough to please all the different groups of people reading my words (and it’s kind of hard writing PC on a Mac! (and making cheesy jokes work on any level (and seeing how long people will follow my parenthetical rants))). I can’t please all the people all the time and right now all those people are reading this blog.

Wouldn’t you love to read a whole blog about the things I entertain myself with thinking about before I fall asleep? Like wondering if I would be successful in the rap world if I changed my name to Cud Kiddy. And then wondering for 5 whole minutes if people would ever get the reference if I told them. Or if it is just me, if I’m the only person who laughs at something like that, and pretends that I don’t think I’m clever sometimes. And then tabling the thought and moving on. Then thinking if I should just stick with waking up in the morning feeling like G Kiddy.

What would be even funnier? If I didn’t think ridiculous things when I can’t fall asleep. Maybe I should just stick to Twitter. That way, that feeling that you might have about how much time of yours I just wasted? Yeah, that would never happen on Twitter.

A year and some change

From where I am now, looking back a year ago is proof that not having things figured out turns out fine.

A year ago things were scary. I graduated, and that afternoon I said goodbye to many of my best friends. One drove off in her car for an internship at a national magazine, and another I drove to the airport (only after we pet some alligators, which is a happier, less emo story).

Then I was left in my apartment for the summer. My hectic full-time class schedule and three part-time jobs came to a halt. I had a bunch of time and seemingly less to fill it with. I stalked a lot of people on Facebook. I got into some shows on the Disney Channel. I got really tan. My one-friend-left-in-town Caitlin and I drove to Colorado via Chicago for no reason and without destination, limit or timeframe.

And the rest of the summer I worked 8-hour days at freshmen orientations, helping calm the fears of freshmen. I answered questions, gave advice and settled them into beginning what for me had just ended.

A year ago I didn’t have a plan. But what is a great truth in all unrest and change, is that feeling uncomfortable is a welcome replacement for feeling miserable. Suddenly having so much of my surroundings uproot and leave (and make like a tree?), acted as a catalyst for me to find something new.

A year ago I decided to throw myself into groups of people I didn’t know. I joined a small group (and actually went). I volunteered without really knowing anyone. I went downtown by myself late at night to meet up with new acquaintances from said volunteering, at a show (Lovedrug and Tigerweather, where I actually met my roommate/friend Rachel). With those small decisions and what almost felt reckless to my quiet, reserved self, I found some great people and made some new friendships. With those first steps I figured out some footing for the next few weeks, which turned into months, which turned into a community I wanted to be a part of for a year.

What does that mean to where I am now?

Well, I’m moving to a new city in September. (WHAT?!)

And a big part of me wonders how I’m going to pull it off.

It feels a lot like the way I felt last year, the first night I spent in an empty apartment knowing no one was going to be coming back.

Even though I lived in the same house from womb to 18, and people in my kindergarten class were in my graduating one, and my “permanent address” has never changed — this last year is the first time in my life I have felt roots under my feet.

Here I am with another first, so I don’t have some piece of wisdom to finish writing with. While I have confidence moving forward knowing all the discomforts of leaving or uncomfortable moments of living in a new place will result in good/great things, ripping out roots is the new thing I’ve yet to figure out.