summer

What is Saving My Summer Life

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 June is done (uggggggh!), and I hate the idea that summer’s almost half over. But here is what is saving my life in these summer months.

  1. Dresses – I am a deep lover of flowy, graceful dresses. Stores like Altar’d State and JessaKae were absolutely made for my aesthetic, if not my wallet. Dresses have always helped me feel my glorious as a feminine figure. Over the past few years, I have leaned into my cottagecore joy with long, full skirts, gauzy sleeves, lots of ruffles, and all the pastels, lacing a romantic air through the most mundane of daily tasks: getting dressed. I recently cleared out several old dresses that were being kept more for nostalgia’s sake than actual wear, reminisced about how pretty they had made me feel, and then packed them up with a whispered blessing for the next girl who finds her glorious in them. Then I coordinated and organized my remaining dresses so my side of the closet is now a gorgeous riot of fluttery rainbow color. I’m still squee-ing about it!
  1. Reading/Books – I am continuing to gobble up stories as fast as I can. I feel bereft if I do not have something to read, to fill my mind with “voices and stories and friends as dear to me as any in the real world” (Little Women, 1994). So far this summer I have devoured seven books, mostly fantasies and historical fiction with a splash of romance for good measure. It is so fun to read things that are unserious and just for the pure enjoyment of the act. Last night, I laid in Spare Oom (my cottagecore-inspired space/guest bedroom), lying in the bed with my mother while she watched old reruns of Archie Bunker. I had my book, she had her show, and we were just laid there together in companionable silence, occasionally broken by one of us making a comment to the cat, who had of course made himself exceeding comfy (belly to the sky) between us on the bed. I have found myself more drawn to my books than my TV shows of late, content to sit in my bed or in the companion recliner in my husband’s den and just inhale story after story. Quite a few of the books I have read have been debut novels, and I am doing my best to make sure that I leave good reviews for those authors so they know how much I appreciate their work. As it is, I post on social media and tag them whenever available so they know just how their hard work is paying off and touching souls. I am also obsessed with pretty books, the ones with gorgeous covers, endpapers, illustrations, and beautiful sprayed/stenciled edges. They are works of art that simply cannot be overlooked. **Side note: if you ever want to give me a gift, give me a book with lovely, stenciled edges. I honestly do not care what the book is; that is utterly beside the point.
  1. Fans – I love to collect hand fans. Carved, lacy, silk, paper, small and soft, large and loud…it doesn’t matter. I love them! They are a beautiful nostalgia for the Sunday evenings when I would sit with my grandmother in church and she would fan me with her gorgeous lace fan or even (gasp!) let me hold it and fan myself. My collection started with a gift from my mother’s coworkers for my college graduation (a genuine fan from Hong Kong) and has just grown from there. I cannot pass up a pretty fan! Recently, I have started taking them everywhere with me. My bag or purse almost always has a fan in it. I even keep one in my desk drawer at work, just in case the unthinkable happens and my always-cold classroom crashes out. It also feeds into my love for the classic feminine aesthetic. Knowing me, my next collection will be parasols.
  1. Water – I hated drinking water as a kid; it tasted like nothing and therefore had no interest for me. Nowadays, through fervent re-conditioning of myself, I cannot cope without a cup of ice water close to hand. I will choose that over just about anything else when it comes to beverages, and I have finally discovered the truth to my mother’s lifelong claims that nothing can hit the spot like cold water. I now have my own collection of pretty tumblers and water cups so that, no matter where I am (home, work, gym, car), I have water close to hand. I am working hard to remember that I need to treat myself like the lovely flower I am and water myself regularly.

As we enter July, I really hope that you find some things that can help to save your life this summer. Things that give you hope and joy, even if they make sense to no one else but you. You deserve that. Always. Meanwhile, I’m off to be a public nuisance at the bookstore with my big-skirted dresses and fans.

Space to Breathe

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Written Sunday, May, 20, 2018

I love Indiana mornings in the late spring and into summer. There’s a stillness to the mornings: the birds singing over their breakfasts, the leaves rustling. No cacophony  of the day yet, just the sounds of the world waking up, beginning. My soul can breathe in these moments, not pant in the rushing or gasp in the lack of space. In these mornings, I can truly “taste and see that the Lord is good”. I can drink in the quiet, breathe, and remember why I love living where I do. There are still so many lovely places left for me to discover, moments of peace I’ve yet to have, of beauty I’ve yet to witness.

Right now, immediately right now, all I want is to go for ad rive to somewhere beautiful in the countryside. It’s all I’m thinking about in this morning, honestly. I just want the sun and the breeze and away from the noise of life. I want rustling leaves, rushing and babbling water, freshness, and clean air. Maybe on Memorial Day or something, I can make this happen somehow, or at least sometime soon.

I have been lacking space to breathe lately, space for my soul to just be and feel. Even when my daughter is abed, I’m still Mommy that waiting just in case she wakes up. I’m still Wife who frets about what housework still needs to be done. I rarely have spaces where I can just be Mel, where my soul can breathe instead of pant or gasp. I want more of them, I need more of them. I want to breathe, both lungs and soul.

So that is my goal for this summer: to breathe.

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The End-of-Summer Letdown

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I get rather down right about now, as summer vacation draws to an end. And I do mean down. Like really down. I hesitate to use the word ‘depressed’ because that is a deeply painful mental illness that causes a great deal of pain to many. I do not wish to invalidate that experience so I will choose not to use that word to describe my end-of-summer mental state. /endsoapbox

Reminder: I’m a junior high teacher. Honestly, though, most of the time, I don’t feel like a very ‘good’ teacher, a real or ‘true’ teacher. I’m not the teacher who stays at work until midnight every night poring over data and redesigning elaborate lesson plans and units. I’m not the teacher who spends the summer weeks teaching summer school or working in my classroom, teaching workshops, or what have you. In fact, I rarely set foot back in the school building after I leave after the last teacher work day until I have to go back at the end of the summer. I don’t get excited about the beginning of the school year. Rather, it makes me nervous, restless, stressed, and even weepy. I mourn the end of my freedom, the sleeping late, the staying up late after the kiddo goes to bed, the day trips with my family, the movie dates with my husband, evenings around the fire-pit, watching my daughter chase fireflies. Now it’ll be back to early nights, earlier mornings, and routine.

I trudge back to school as heavily as any student. I tend to become withdrawn; I stick to myself, hole up in my classroom, ostensibly to get things done, but it’s also really because I will be dealing with people—lots of them—day in and day out for the next ten months or so. I will have no choice in the matter. There’s also a chance that I will be a “veteran” teacher in the 8th grade this year so that means possibly answering a lot of questions from the other teachers in my hall. So I am hoarding my spoons, trying to build and store them up for the coming school year.

I will be stressed and tired and may be functional at best for a while, but I will do my best. Things will get easier. I will work hard to teach my students what they need to know, about language arts and literature, but especially about what it means to be a good person, to live with integrity, to have courage, and be kind. And I know that it will be as much a continuous lesson for me as it will be for them.