A Season for Business Cards (and no job)...

It’s strange really, in many ways it feels like I’m living through deja vu. I have walked this path before and somehow find myself again, tripping amongst the roots of a very simple question. 

“What do you do?”

Many of us determine our identity based on our careers and our jobs - “I am a teacher”, “I am an accountant”, “I am a potato chip inspector”…. and why wouldn't we?  These are the forms in which purpose and structure are brought to the majority of our day. However, in some ways I feel as though our culture has made the questions “what do you do?” and “who are you?” synonymous with one another?

You see, the question ‘who are you?’ leads to a more complicated answer of passions, interests, belief systems etc. It’s a question that is rarely asked and maybe should be more often. Somehow I fear that we are too afraid to ask something deeper of one another and are quite comfortable with surface talk.  

Might I suggest that there is something inherent that we long for outside of work? We long to be accepted, to be valued and yet these desires have nothing to do with our profession. If the value we place on our profession is the only thing we find our value in then we are significantly missing the mark.

By no means am I ‘back-peddling’ out of working. Work is the outward expression of our passions. And, by no means do I pretend that I do not pour myself into work and neglect everything else because I am completely guilty of that as well.

The irony is that my degree is in Therapeutic Recreation. Yes, you heard right, Basket Weaving 101. Let me explain in a few short words what I spent 6 years learning…

- Growth in every aspect of your life is vital -

There are various domains to our well-being (spiritual, emotional, physical, social) and if one of those is lacking, we may not feel fulfilled or may overcompensate in other ways. Balance in one’s life brings growth, beauty and perspective.

This time around (being temporarily unemployed), I have a completely different mind-set. I know this season of life is short. One day soon I will have another job, down the road we will have a family and there will never be enough time to be balanced. Many of you may say this is entirely impossible and yet I still feel that it is something to strive for. To acknowledge that we are so much more than one form of identity – a co-worker, a mother, a good neighbor.

A friend of mine moved to another country two years ago and recently found a job within the last year. When asked what she did for the first year her reply was “I learned a lot about myself”. Those words resonated with me for days and brought comfort to my soul. There have been various seasons of my life and a few of them have been times of waiting. What an opportunity I have to explore other aspects of myself that I have neglected for far too long, to nurture other passions and gifts. I am grateful for this time and would not change a thing.

So, instead of answering “What do you do?" I’d like to turn it around and answer, “Who are you?”…

I am creative

I am compassionate

I am impatient at times

I am unfortunately addicted to starches (I’m partial to the potato variety)

I am an adoring wife

I am a grateful daughter

I am a child of God

And, I am at peace with where I am right now.

A Season for Oven Mitts and Lipstick

     10 Things I've Learned in the First Few Weeks in Luxembourg:

1. If you need to start a kitchen from scratch – oven mitts should be your FIRST purchase!

2. Always make sure you make eye contact with the bus driver, otherwise you too may be stranded at an Ikea in Belgium as the last bus of the day drives by…

3. I need to invest in more heels and lipstick, ladies dress like ladies here.

4. People drive on the right side of the road but walk on the left side of the sidewalk…puzzling.

5.  Belgium waffles. Are. The. Best. Thing. Ever.

6. Luxembourgers may be more polite than Canadians….it's true.

7. You can have language overload. Sitting at the City Hall in Esch I noticed, all signs were in French, the locals were speaking Luxembourgish, a German TV news station was on and English songs were playing on the radio.

8. I am unashamedly becoming a ‘foodie’. Fresh cheese, great wine, rich chocolates. How can you go wrong? Dinner menu this week: homemade cilantro black bean cakes with a cayenne yogurt sauce and Dijon chicken in a garlic cream sauce with crimini mushrooms and toasted almonds.

9. "Mr. Clean” products are called “Mr. Proper” – I feel this is a much more suitable name being on this side of the pond.

10.  Water is LITERALLY more expensive than wine – case in point, 4€ for bottled water and 2€ for a glass of red wine from Bordeaux. It’s all in the sake of saving money right?! 

A Season for Long Goodbyes

Cut to scene: It is 1938 in Salzburg, Austria and you are a guest at an extravagant party. The Captain has decided to welcome the Baroness, Elsa Schraeder, to the VonTrapp family in full flair. Luxurious evening gowns, champagne and ambient chatter fill the usually orderly home. As the evening winds down, the Captains’ seven children gather together and sing a melodious song…‘So Long Farewell’. They charm the audience with their talent and innocent humor as they gracefully bid the audience adieu. One by one the long goodbye begins…

These last few years have been littered with goodbyes. I suppose our long goodbye began the day we decided to become nomads and left Canada. The moment Ken decided to pursue his PhD was the moment that changed the path we were on. We had a house, I had a great job, and our friends and family were close by. What this decision meant was that there would be several moves in our future and several blank chapters that we would need to fill. Albeit, everyone has unknowns in life, but consciously choosing them over the stability we had seemed slightly absurd.

With all of these unknowns, this leap of faith would require first saying goodbye to some sense of security and familiarity. Despite being a great career move for Ken, there is still something intrinsic that pleads for comfort. Maybe this is a ‘woman thing’, but abandoning these ideals seemed to go against the fiber of my being. And yet, the door was open and the sound of regret echoed louder than our fears.

When we arrived in Florida we knew that it would not be our permanent home and despite this awareness, we put down roots. It was a time to meet new people, form lifelong friendships, travel and follow our passions in careers we loved. Despite the challenges we faced (and there were some – moving countries can get messy logistically), I can’t help but look at that time as one of the greatest times of growth personally and within our marriage.  

And then one day the clock started ticking and just like the Von Trapp children, one by one our long goodbyes began.

Clearly we saw this coming, it was no surprise. We had known for five years that this was not a permanent move, but it did not make the goodbyes any easier. Ken had finished his PhD – our time was up. We affectionately refer to the last few months in Gainesville as our ‘Farewell Tour’. The intentional get-togethers, the goodbye work parties, the trips to friends’ hometowns, the ‘Last Supper’… these were unapologetically difficult, but also affirmed that our lives are so much richer for being on this journey.

And just when we thought the tour had ended, the encore played. We were home for the summer before our move to Europe and little Gretel had her final solo. It was the sweetest goodbye of them all.

So here we are, on the tail end of another emotional roller coaster and in the midst of a life full of adventure, chaos and unknowns. I am however, blessed beyond words and would not change a thing. Recently, I have thought a lot about goodbyes. Life is full of them, and should be embraced as something that is at times inevitable. Dare I say, some goodbyes may even be a good thing? I have said goodbye to many things in my life besides people: bad habits, hair colors, Florida cockroaches in our apartment!… but if I am indifferent towards something, this is when I question my heart. To say goodbye to dear friends and family and not feel anything would place very little value on the relationship. So, I suppose the many tears I’ve shed in the last few months is truly a testament of the joy and thankfulness I feel.

The question is, are all of these goodbyes worth it?

Absolutely.

I have a heart bursting with gratitude for the opportunities we’ve been given, the friendships we’ve made and the family that gives us the freedom to follow our calling.

A Reason for the Season

When asked to write a description of this blog, a few thoughts came to mind – a travel blog (fun), a way to keep friends and family informed (great), a public diary (concerning), a form of self psycho analysis (very concerning). Unfortunately, the latter may be all too true but I’ll try not to make this too heavy.

Despite my potential selfish reasons for starting this blog, there is one truth that I have learned this year that makes this entire idea make sense – life is meant to be shared. We were created to have relationship and community and to walk through life together.

This year has marked some of the greatest joys and heart wrenching trials I have experienced. These are the seasons of my life.  The sun has shone in summer and I have felt the warmth of a very blessed life. The cold breath of winter has also left me chilled and on my knees. Seasons change, that is a constant. And this is my desire, not only to share the seasons of summer, but to share my heart honestly.

I’m not quite sure why I feel compelled to have my thoughts in black and white. In reality, I had created this blog back in 2011 and never wrote a single entry (the courage to press submit on this post should be greatly rewarded). Maybe it’s the act of revealing yourself in such a way that you are vulnerable, exposing your truest self to the possibility of judgment and criticism. It could also very well be the fact that everyone will see what poor grammar I got! Regardless, here are my thoughts in black and white, as I walk through the seasons of my life…