Mystery and Spaces

I have a few different posts I've got to get posted before November starts: an election day research project, and a Pinterest challenge update ( yeah you thought I'd given up, never fear guys I am slowly inching closer to that 30 pin goal.)

Despite the urgent need to post my first political post and to post pictures of my latest projects, I won't be writing either of those posts today. Today I want to write about something a little more spiritual  ( original right?). Maybe it's because of the particularly thought provoking, old episode of House I watched on ion yesterday? In any case, here we go again.

In my studies there was a certain line of logic that came up frequently . It went something like this; human beings feel the need to explain mystery (using language ) and thus make up stories and belief systems to compensate for their fear(?) of the unknown ( W. Barnett Pearce, check him out, courtesy of the first seemingly scholarly work that popped up on google) . Many people use this line of logic to argue that religion and faith are really just compensation for the unknown. Some might even argue that this is evidence that science is the best way to come to know ( obviously false as science is itself a belief system which seeks to explain the unknown for the same reason). There was always something that bothered me in the class discussions that centered around this idea.

Why do we stop asking why when we get to mystery? I struggled in class to put words to the feeling I had whenever we got down to this question. It felt like putting the brakes on to quickly. By asking why, logic had somehow gotten us to the conclusion that human beings feel the need to explain mystery/the unknown but we stopped there. I think a better question to ask is why do human beings feel the need to explain the unknown? You don't see cats walking around contemplating the meaning of life. They eat they sleep they get on with things , and that seems to be enough for them. At least, they've yet to start up institutions where they sit around all day mewling at each other about it ...at least not that I know of...although now that I come to think of it cats do seem to slip off discreetly on a fairly regular basis. Elephants don't seem to have been seized by a an urge to stare up at the stars and chart their movement across the night sky. I've yet to see an ape look ponderously at a flock of birds flying and jot measurements down.

What cues us in to the fact that there are things we don't know? I've seen Beta shocked by one thing or another, but I haven't ever found her later curled up in a corner with the spark of a burning question in her eyes. You get what I'm saying , yeah there's evidence of some animals mourning their dead but this isn't exactly compelling evidence that they are trying to explain the unknown.

Personally, I feel less fearful of the unknown and more drawn to it. Sometimes I find myself obsessing about life after death, other times I am pinning images of what I hope is in my future like somehow that makes the future a little more knowable.

Why are we drawn to these questions? Do we see spaces, absences where there are none? I don't think we do. Deep down, we know that there is more , something beyond. Our stories express this , touch on these deeply felt gaps in mortal knowledge. For "time ", something we've created to measure our seemingly limited lives, there's "eternity" something that defies our own institution and points to something bigger, something more ( is it "more"?). We feel it and so we ask, once we've asked we must explain...at least, that's my explanation ;)






*P.S. Maybe some of you don't think you do ask these questions , but unless you made a conscious decision to leave society in favor of a culturally isolated life and also chose to give up language then you are partaking in a belief system that answers these questions for you and thus you have been relieved of that fundamental need for now.*

For a Little Lamb who is Lost

This poem is for a little lamb who is lost. It is special in that it was written as a personal lament for one person. If you relate to this piece, feel free to share it. However please do not use it for political ends, for that is not why it was written, and will be made hollow in such an attempt.

How far will you wander away little lamb,

 before you know you are lost?

How much are you willing to pay,

 little lamb, before you realize the cost?

You give yourself o'er and o'er, little lamb,

once pure without blemish or spot.

Gladly you'll be a sacrifice now, 

O'er the heathen , gentile's pot.

Answer the Master's call little lamb

'fore you find yourself tossed in the pit.

Wait not til that day at the judgement bar,

at which too the Lord will sit. 

I'll be back friends

In the last few weeks my time on the internet has become limited. It's been a great thing, but it means that I have to make sure I bring the right notebook with me when I intend to post a blog post ;) Don't worry I've got a thoughtful poem already written and waiting to be posted, as well as an update on that pinterest challenge you thought you'd have heard more about by now. Keep coming back , I promise I'll be here soon!

Sustainability

I first heard the term "Sustainability" from my roommate ( who later became a best friend and bridesmaid) Michelle Stevens. It was within the first few days of our meeting my freshman year, she described the AP Sustainability class she'd taken at her high school in Oregon. Only in Oregon right?

As I continued my studies, sustainability continued to pop up as a more and more important issue. I read books such as The Age of Missing Information by Bill McKibben, which drew to my attention the cultural problem of a disconnect from nature. I co-wrote a 20 page paper about it. I fell in love with Wendell Berry. I started a pinterest board. I cherished finding this book at Justin's grandma's...

Justin and I have enjoyed several of the longest conversations we've ever had ( remember how he doesn't really talk much?) about "organic" food and farmers' markets. Between his interest in health and preventative medicine, and my own theories about the socio-cultural benefits of local growing and reconnecting with nature we could go on for hours.

In the end though, my dear husband in all of his wisdom has again led me to ask myself this question; What am I doing about it? I defended myself to him by saying that even little changes were big ones for me, but as I go through this whole "being present" phase I can't help thinking that if this really is something I believe in /cherish, then I can't just file it away for the "when we get rich enough to buy a little plot of land" future.

These are the little things I am doing now:

1)Opening the blinds each morning and turning off lights whenever they are on

2)Reading books and articles about sustainability and living off the land

3)Asking Grandparents about growing up, and the logistics of homesteading ( so far I've learned about raising rabbits for meat, dairy cows, beef cows, sheep, bee-keeping, and horses)

4)Trying to change my clothes less, and re-wearing clothing that isn't soiled before washing it

5)Helping Justin's grandma( and learning in the process) tend a vegetable garden

Our first sprout-a pea shoot

6)Reusing and Upcycling plastic containers, paper towels, etc.

These are some things that I think I can add into my routine now:

1)Hanging sheets, towels, and running clothes to dry

Justin has already started.

 2)Using more of what we have, making sure I plan well enough that we aren't throwing out food.

3)Donating to a charity that focuses on making villages etc. more sustainable ( areas where there are inefficient water sources etc.

4)Eating healthier

5)Taking more nature walks, spending more time in the backyard, camping more.

6)Reading more Wendell Berry :)

 What do you think? What does sustainability mean to you? Can you think of something I should add to my list?

My basil and chives

Running the Race

When I first started running cross country, I used to do something that caused coaches and more experienced runners to shake their heads, perhaps even chuckle. I used to start my races out very fast. Once, at the Woodbridge High invitational, I even kept pace with Jordan Hassay for about 600m! My coach tried and tried to convince me to run a more evenly paced race. " Slow it down! Don't kill yourself in the first half mile, you'll run a much faster race if you slow down that first mile." she repeated again and again as I went from being a freshman to a senior. I never did quite get the message.

Last year, in my third year of racing at the collegiate level I finally started to get it. If I was confidant, and didn't allow myself to be pressured into a pace that was much too fast for me to handle, I would give a beautiful performance, and run a stronger better, sustained race. I think too, that understanding pacing contributed to my love for the sport. When I paced myself, I wasn't suffering throughout the whole race. Certainly I felt fatigue, but there were these incredible moments where I felt like I was flying, like I was meant to be where I was, like I had an awareness of and control over my body that I simply didn't have ordinarily.

 This season, though I have not yet raced, I have already made the mistake of starting out too fast. After a blissful summer and long transition phase in which I took on part-time work ( I like to think of this time as my pre-race warm up), I decided it was about time I started making the big bucks. In addition to my job as Chandler High's head coach I took on a 15 hour/ week job as a media specialist for the City of Casa Grande. After a long first day working both jobs I came home to the joyous ( sarcasm) news that my substitute clearance card had finally arrived. Now I tried furiously to work out a schedule in which I could sub several days a week on top of the other two jobs. I hit a lowpoint on Friday, when both jobs required me to work outside of normal hours. As we drove to Chandler ( my sweet husband tries to make as many of my cc practices as he can) I whined despairingly to Justin that this was ridiculous, that I felt terrible, that I was an inadequate excuse for a human being. "It's not really a big deal", said my ever-calm husband. " so what if he's mad?" I heaved in a angry, rattling breath " So what if he's mad?!? Justin this man could fire me if he wanted to!"

Justin looked at me with those eyes of his and said quietly and seriously "So."

I'm pretty sure Justin is an old soul, a 25 year old just shouldn't be that wise.

The fact is that Justin is right of course. So what if I make a mistake or get fired. Really, in the long run, how much will that matter?  The situation reminded me about a talk by Hugh Nibley , entitled "Work we must, but the lunch is free" Nibley talks about our tendency to spend the majority of our time and energy working for our lunch. How many hours a week do we spend to put "bread on the table?" For Americans, that number has been steadily increasing , despite our predecessors making the projection that American's would be able to cut back on hours and enjoy more leisure time by now.
The problem is that our lunch box is ever expanding, and we are spending more and more time trying to fill it.

*The average American these days is not happy with the comfortable one story her/his parents owned. Media portraits tend to lead us to believe that the "average" American should have much more than is financially feasible. Take the show Friends , for example, a group of young inconsistently employed single adults living in Manhattan in that size apartment , expressing little concern for impending bills? Seeing this, perhaps we feel that we cannot rest until we have our perfect place , our giant apartment with Pottery Barn furnishings. Perhaps we feel that squeezing in a 60, 70, or 80 hour week is perfectly normal, so long as we are putting "bread" on the table.

Nibley suggests, however, that this attitude is contrary to gospel principals. "[The idea that there is]"No free lunch" easily directs our concern to "nothing but lunch." The Adversary keeps us to that principle, making lunch our full–time concern either by paying workers so little that they must toil day and night just to afford lunch (his favorite trick), or by expanding the lunch–need to include all the luxury and splendor that goes with the super–executive ... lunch,"

These thoughts lead me to one of the most important skills to master as a runner. Running the right course. I have been sprinting around in circles without progressing toward the finish line. I have been working hard and long for money, and neglecting the things that really matter; my God, my husband, and my eternal progression. I want to start living my life the way it was meant to be lived, according to my Heavenly Father's will and progressing toward being like Him.

I don't think I need to quit my jobs in order to make this happen, but I do need to shift my focus, worry more about how I am treating my husband rather than what my boss will think of my best effort.  I trust that as the "lilies of the field" I will be fed and sheltered gloriously, so long as I am striving to achieve my eternal purpose.


* I am working on citing this.
I was inspired to write this post by this talk by President Monson, who I believe to be a living Prophet.

Pep Talk

I've come to learn that life is full of in-betweens. Personally, I've developed a very bad habit in looking forward to the big landmarks? without appreciating life for what it is--an everyday thing. I wrote in my last blog about living in the present and it's proving easier said than done. I am so impatient to get to the next part of life that it's turning out to be very difficult to pay much attention to the here and now.

For example, when we planned on moving to Casa Grande, we planned on my substitute teaching along with coaching at Chandler high. Substituting seemed like the ideal job for where we are at in life right now, since it is flexible and the pay makes my bachelor's degree seem worth getting. Unfortunately I am  still waiting to get my fingerprints cleared. We hoped it'd be about a 5 week wait and it's been 8. I called last week and they said it would still be another 1-2 weeks. So up until this point we've been struggling financially and I've spent most of my days waiting for cross country practice to start. Luckily the first installment of my coaching check came along on Thursday. {That day was a high/low point, let's just say there was giddy laughter and dancing around over $400}

In any case, here I am, waiting. I have another job possibility which I will write about in more detail later, but fate is not on my side in that case either. Up until last night I was feeling pretty useless.At the beginning of this year,  I'd have given anything to have time on my hands. There were so many books to be read, poems to be written, pinterest projects to get done. Now I have the time, but lack the funds.  Oh the irony. Still I realized last night that I am being ridiculous. I have been blessed with so much! So I've decided to give myself a virtual pep talk.Here it goes (sharp intake of breath)
Wake up Kelsey, take a walk. Read a book! Watch your pitiful vegetable seedlings get blasted away by dust storms! Enjoy your life for what it is, and be happy with it. You have a sweet , kind , loving husband. You get closer everyday to figuring out where you'll settle for the next three years. This is a transitory state, and there is so much to see and learn from in these little transitional blips. So stop whining , wake up early work hard and love your life!

You too guys. Wherever you are, whatever misshapen figure your life is currently cutting, love it and most importantly LIVE IT. Be happy with where your at. The little dot you now inhabit on the map of time and space is a unique one, perhaps never before seen! explore it, discover it , don't let it slip away!

Home

 This isn't the first time I've written about navigating the transition to an adulthood version of "home."I guess it probably won't be the last.

For me this whole concept of home has been an ongoing problem. It started when I left home of course. Up 'til then things were quite clear cut. My freshman year of college was like standing on the edge of something, I could sense that my idea of home was changing, but I still knew where home was. I still felt tied to my parents in Lancaster, still made it absolutely clear to everyone I spoke with that that was where home was. Sophomore year came along and I got engaged and once or twice I said the words "back home" in reference to Hawaii rather than to Lancaster. I always felt as though I was a traitor when I did slip up though, like somehow the cramped dorm room I shared with people who would come to hold a special significance in my life wasn't worthy of the word. Home was reserved for Mom and for Dad and what they had built for me. Friends who had become a constant part of my life, who had taken on the role of a family to me; they were a predicament, tossed to the back of my mind in the "this-is-a-weird-stage-of-my-life" category.

Then I got married and the challenge of pin-pointing "home" could no longer be pushed aside. As you may recall, I battled with the word's usage, with it's meaning, and what a change in home symbolized about where I was in my life. I had left the nest, but I wasn't so sure I could call any other place home.

I have to say that this battle seems to be an ongoing one. We moved in with my parents for a few months after graduation, not because we didn't have anywhere else to go but because my Mom asked me to, and frankly it didn't seem natural not to. That's what I've always done for the summer holidays and that was my automatic first choice; Justin didn't really mind either way so we went home. I loved every minute of being there, but part of me knew that it wouldn't have been good to stay much longer. It was all too easy to slide back into the role I had filled in that home-- the role of the child, the role of the whiny teenager, being chauffeured around and shirking real responsibility. Toward the end, I could tell that the carefully constructed relationship Justin and I had worked so hard at building was devolving with my lapses in maturity. We weren't Man and Wife there, I was the oldest kid and Justin was the accoutrement that came along with me. It wasn't that my parents or sisters prompted that, just that I was easily tempted to opt for the easier role, and it didn't reflect the growth we had experienced in our first year of marriage. It didn't recognize the new multiplicity of home.

Last weekend I visited my cousin Kathryn in Glendale. The long drive was well worth the spiritual nourishment and stimulating conversation I found there. No really ...we had a 9 hour conversation...LITERALLY. Kathryn and I have always been close, and our talk ranged from catching up to the time-space continuum. I mention this visit because it really got me to thinking about this whole idea of home in several ways. For one thing, I felt at home in Kathryn's apartment. Here was someone whom I loved and trusted, someone I was raised with , more than a best friend, someone who knew the intricate details of my life from childhood 'til now. It seemed for a moment like little piece of home here in Arizona, while I try to navigate my way around this new place in location and time. But I was a visitor, and Kathryn's home indisputably belonged to her and Stuart ( her husband) just as my home belongs exclusively to Justin and I. That's where I hit on it. Home is more than just a location...but it is tied to location. Parts of my conversation with Kathryn inspired the follow up to that thought.

In one of my college classes, Aesthetics actually, a professor illustrated for us an idea about the interaction between time and space. In her illustration, time and space were the x and y coordinates of a never ending graph (complete with those arrows on the end that mean forever) Thus, though most of us separate the two , both time and space are needed in order to understand something's place. In art that might mean that we shouldn't classify a painting based only on what time period it comes from, but also where it comes from geographically. I am starting to feel as though it is even more complicated than that too, because those two coordinates don't seem to fully encompass other "locations" ...like culture...but it's hard enough to wrap my head around the interrelationship between the two so I'll stick with that for now.

In any case, this graph seemed to get at how eternity works. Since both axis are ever expanding,   (could they be chords of the universe?) there are an infinite number of possibilities as to where we might be. Our limitation lies in the fact that we are tied to this earth, both chronologically and geographically. Time, for us, is moving only forward. Space, for us, has only recently reached our own planet's moon.

I blame our time-space limitations for this whole predicament. See, all of us are so used to seeing things on this mortal plane that when something eternal comes to us we grapple with it. Home, in more than one place at the same time? Home in the same place at different times? Home in one place and then it's not home and then it is again? "That just isn't how life works!" I sometimes want to scream. "Everything stays in place but me Universe! Home is there and I am here , I move --not it." ...Somehow my previous logic, that only Mom and Dad's place can be home sort-of seems like that long-ago idea that the universe revolved around the Earth!

What I think, is that home is not bound to this mortal sphere. Home is eternal and exists in more than one place or time. Home looks like this.

It's hard to grasp since our mortal existence occupies a single dot on the graph, but that eternal something within us knows and accepts home for what it is, a precious universal that holds more meaning than we will ever know in this life.