Years and Decades

New Year's Eve is one of my favorite days of the year, because it allows me to reflect on the old year and plan for/think about the coming one. And I am nothing if not self-reflective.

The end of this year in particular is poignant because it marks the end of a decade. (I know, I know, technically the new decade doesn't start until 2021, but let me have my moment, okay?) Maybe it's just me, but I feel like not as many people were excited about 2010? I specifically remember everyone being reallllly excited for 2000, and it seems like people are really excited for 2020, but I cannot remember the hype for 2010. Or maybe it was there and I just don't remember it.

This year has been challenging. It is hard for me to publicly write about challenges as they are happening (especially if those challenges are more chronic that crisis in nature). But 2019 has been hard. Waiting is hard. And all you can do sometimes is keep moving forward.

There have been good moments, too, like passing my general exams (hooray!), visiting with family and friends, traveling to Chile, having a good internship with the Office of the Historian at the State Department, and finally putting together a dissertation committee and feeling like maybe, just maybe, I have some kind of grasp on this PhD thing.

When I look back on this decade, I am amazed at how much happened. How much I did and how many people I met and the woman I became over this decade and who I am still becoming. If I could choose a theme for this decade, it would be something along the lines of, "I'm glad I didn't get what I wanted at age 19 by age 20." There are so many turning points that happened to me this decade. Where or who would I be without going to Cambridge? Without meeting so many dear friends at BYU? Without going to BYU? Without the decision to serve a mission? Without UKRAINE? Without deciding to go to grad school? Without going to Oxford? Without meeting, dating, and marrying Sam? Without deciding to go to Princeton and choosing to still stick with this PhD?

[Typical Megan ca. 2010]

[Typical Megan ca. now--my hair is the same length as it was about 10 years ago. haha.]

It's impossible to truly know the counterfactuals. And honestly? I don't think I want to know. I'm sure that without those experiences, life would have still been good and beautiful. But there is a richness from those experiences that has made my life so complete and which has given me a good launching pad for the next decade of my life.

And so, Happy New Year. I hope that 2020 gives you good and beautiful things. And that you get reminders of your worth, of your potential, and of how much you are loved.

A thrill of hope

This December, Sam and I have celebrated the Advent season in our home and have had friends come over to celebrate it with us. (Most people who read this will know what Advent is, but for those who don't, it is more than just a countdown calendar--although those are certainly fun. It is a Christian celebration of preparing for the life, teachings, love, and Second Coming of Jesus Christ. Advent is celebrated the four Sundays before Christmas, and there is usually an Advent wreath with lit candles involved.)

Honoring Advent has been a lovely, warm way to prepare for Christmas in our home. I find that there are some years--and some times of life (being a student one of them)--where it is harder to prepare yourself emotionally and spiritually for Christmas. What I like about the Advent tradition is that it allows for reflection and time to slow down in a time of year filled with busy-ness (and business). It allows for a time to critically think about your relationships with God, others, and yourself.

This year, celebrating Advent has been a way for me to turn my thoughts to Christ, and to think about the ways He brings hope, peace, joy, love, and light into this world. It has also helped me think more critically about the definitions of hope, peace, joy, and love, and to come to terms more with the ways hope and despair; peace and discord; joy and distress; and love and indifference are tied together. It has helped me have more courage to confront darkness with resolve, while believing that the light will come.

Advent is about the waiting. We are all waiting for something. And waiting is hard. That waiting and longing for peace, for healing, for things to resolve themselves, for justice . . . it is hard. Advent acknowledges that we are all waiting, but it also asks us to think about what waiting looks like. How do we wait? Advent is about longing, certainly. It is about the longing for a better world. But it is about working for that better world. It is also about coming to the joint realization that there is only so much your hands and heart can do, but at the same time, the only hands and hearts God has ever had to work with are hands and hearts like ours.

How do we wait? It is about recognizing the opposition in all things. Advent is about loss and sorrow, while also being about beauty and grace.

How do we wait? We live with radical love. We hold the ambiguity and uncertainty of our lives with humility, patience, and courage. We face the world with bravery, choosing to take joy with gratitude and sorrow without resentment.

Tonight, we'll light the last candle, symbolizing love--the love of Christ, the love of god which sent Christ into the world to live and die for us. The love which binds the world and heals our hearts and fills us with light. Sometimes it is hard to feel that love--hard to feel love for (or from) ourselves, others, or God. But part of Christmas is believing that love is there. And that it has the power to change lives. If it does anything, the Christmas story reminds me where love is found--in small, simple, unremarkable places; but that those people and places are sanctified through the love, touch, and arrival of God.

Thinking about the small and simple ways love makes itself grandly manifest in our lives reminds me of a quote by the literary critic Terry Eagleton:

"Salvation turns out to be an embarrassingly prosaic affair--a matter of feeding the hungry, giving drink to the thirsty, welcoming the stranger, and visiting the imprisoned. It has no 'religious' glamour or aura whatsoever. Anybody can do it. The key to the universe turns out to be not some shattering revelation. [. . .] The cosmos revolves on comforting the sick. When you act in this way, you are sharing in the love which built the stars."

There are so many different ways to view love. Love is grand, but love is simple. It is through those ties that bind us to each other; it is love which ultimately heals us and brings us back to the presence of God.

It is love that we wait for, and it is love that comes to us as a gift, even (especially) when we are far from deserving it. It strengthens, it comforts, it supports, it fills, it heals.

[j. kirk richards, christ among the lepers

/via/]

Whatever your beliefs this holiday season, I wish you hope, peace, joy, and love. And in whatever you are waiting for, I hope you find direction, resolve, courage, and comfort during the waiting.

Merry Christmas.

NYC at Christmas

I've never experienced New York City at Christmas time. Even though I've lived in the NYC metropolitan area for about 2.5 years now, I still haven't made the trek up to the city to see the lights and bask in Christmas cheer. I figured that this was the year to do it.

Most of our day was spent walking (Sam tracked about 20,000 steps!). But when we stopped, it was for food and Christmas lights.

Food stop 1: Katz's Delicatessen.

Katz's is basically semi-controlled anarchy. But, their pastrami sandwich was worth the chaos. 

Food stop 2: Fabrique Bakery. 

I wanted to try a kardemummabullar ever since I saw Henry on this year's Great British Bakeoff make them. They looked so good. I tried making them, but I messed up on the dough rise, and so I ended up with really heavy cardamom buns. 

This is what they're supposed to look like. 

And they taste so, SO GOOD. Definitely worth the trip and the extra 20 minutes to have a new batch come out of the oven. 10/10 recommend. 

[and this Swedish bakery is just so cozy.]

Last stop: The Christmas lights. 

I wasn't expecting the Christmas tree (the tree) at Rockefeller Center to be as incredible as it was, but I was utterly delighted by it. I stopped mid-sentence to let out a "Whoa!" when I saw the tree. It lived up to the hype. And I was delighted. 

[This is where I stopped talking and was like, "I need to take a picture." Still doesn't properly capture the moment. Maybe if I had a better camera? Still probably not.]

[The TREE]

[Right before this, we got in the way of a proposal picture, and then right after this, we got in the way of a family picture. Go us.]

All in all, even though going to New York alllllways exhausts us, it was a good day in the city. Maybe New York is growing on me? Or maybe it's just Christmas magic. 

Threshold

So . . . my parents gave Sam a Costco Membership for Christmas (yes, we got it early).

And we feel like we have entered this new phase of adulthood. 

Costco shopping dates, Costco samples, and Costco pizza are now all at our fingertips. 

If this isn't power, I don't know what is. 

Recent recommendations [i]

What I've been reading:

Recently, I've been reading Svetlana Alexievich's The Unwomanly Face of War: An Oral History of Women in World War II. It is a literary masterpiece, in my opinion. I've read other works by Svetlana Alexievich, including Chernobyl Prayer (also sometimes called Voices from Chernobyl), which is a collection of oral histories she collected from people affected or involved with the 1986 disaster in Chernobyl. This book is a collection of oral histories from women who fought or otherwise participated in World War II. It's a book about Soviet women, partisans, and less about the glory of war than the everyday messiness, tragedies, and small kindnesses that composed life at the front. It's an absolutely stunning (and gutting) read so far. 10/10 would recommend, and I haven't even finished it yet.

What I've been listening to:

Podcasts: Sam and I finished listening to a season of "The Dream" which is an investigation into Multi-Level Marketing. It's both fascinating and horrifying. Their next season is going to be an investigation into the wellness industry, and I'll be interested to listen to that, too.

I've also been listening to the American Girls podcast, which is a podcast by two newly-minted History PhDs, and they are going through all of the American Girls books, starting with the original six. Right now they are on the "Kirsten" series. They are pretty fun to listen to.

Sam and I have also been listening to "Dolly Parton's America." Whether or not you are a fan of Dolly Parton/country music, you will probably like this podcast.

Music: CHRISTMAS MUSIC. Specifically the "Christmas at King's" playlist on Spotify.

What I've been eating: 

Roasted broccoli. And Satsuma Mandarin Oranges from Wegman's. Yum.

Monday morning musings

(which will probably be posted on Monday evening or Tuesday morning, but that's just how things go.)

Yesterday I tried to make rolls, but we have no counter space in our apartment, which means it's difficult to roll out the rolls, resulting in massive buns. Luckily, the recipe is good, and the buns taste really good, but next time I will have to 1) Make room at our table for rolling out roll dough, and 2) be more patient and careful as I roll them out. I will try the recipe again . . . but maybe on a day when I have more patience.

As I made the roll dough, I decided that it was high time that I listen to Christmas music (I used to be a person who only listened to Christmas music after Thanksgiving, but that changed after Ukraine). So I put on a Spotify playlist called "Christmas at King's" and listened to the stirring, high, clear boyish soprano singing the first verse of "Once in Royal David's City" and all seemed right with the world.

I've been compiling a memoir. It's not much. I think of it more as a writing project to make sense of my twenties, but it has been interesting for me to go back--both in physical journals and in these blogs--and see the passage of time. The blog especially made me realize how quickly time actually goes (although it hardly felt like that at times, especially when waiting for an application to come through, or for a relationship to fizzle or to take off, or when wrestling with health problems). But the time has gone by--too quickly by, and I can tell it will only get faster from here.

Reading my journals and blog posts have also reminded me of just how much I have changed, and of turning points in my life. Sometimes those turning points are seismic; other times, they are not so much turning points as erosions of a former self, or a sedimentary buildup of someone new. Some journals hold the events of just one summer; others, the events of a year and a half.

We'll see how this writing project goes. I don't know what I'll do with it. But it's been useful for me, especially as someone prone to reflection. It's been good to remember who I've been, who I am, and what I've been through. It's good for me to remember how I am loved and the relationships that matter to me.

Speaking of relationships, I am forming a new sort of relationship with my dissertation committee (I finally chose people for it! And, am finally feeling at ease with it). I had a prospectus defense (more like meeting, since our department doesn't really do prospectus defenses) with my advisor and first reader, and it went well! They've approved my prospectus and were both really enthusiastic about the project. So now I'm officially ABD (all-but-dissertation)/a PhD candidate, and it feels really good! I feel like I don't do a very good job, either on my blog or in real life, of explaining my life as a PhD student and what that means/what are wins/what my research interests are, but in plain speak, getting this prospectus approved is definitely a win, and I'm really grateful that I get to move on to the next stage of my PhD (which will mainly be researching and writing).

Onward and upward.

Snapshots of autumn

A few memories almost forgotten from October and early November: 

-Princeton really showed up for fall this year. 

-There is, surprisingly, a Naim June Paik art piece on display in Trenton. 

-Sam and I went to Utah for Fall Break and it was very much needed, from seeing family, to friends, to talking with old professors at BYU, to hiking in real mountains. 

[hiking in rock canyon]

[sam in his element]

[you just don't get views like this in jersey.]

[somehow i neglected to take photos of every other friend and family interaction while we were out there, so this picture with rebecca will have to serve as a stand-in for all wonderful interactions we had with family and friends.]

-We also saw the Spiral Jetty and Promontory Point while we were there (shout out to Dani for coming with us), and they were both worth the half-day trip. 

[sooooo cool.]

[at the place where the golden spike was driven. the golden spike is now at stanford.]

-Utah always gets cold at the the end of October before warming up again . . . and then diving back into freezing temperatures. Princeton is doing the same thing. 

[case in point. the fountain froze over the other week.]

Since we spent Fall Break in Utah, we missed the final glory days of Princeton fall. But what the trees lack in color now is made up for by some beautiful late-autumn sunsets. And for those I am grateful. 

Is beauty all that matters? Or, why Prince Derek's response is what Instagram would have us believe

There was something profound I was thinking when I was walking home this afternoon, but now the moment has passed, and so has the clarity of profundity. But I think (hope) that maybe if I just keep writing, then the meaning will come back, if not crystal clear, then at least still somewhat good (if also somewhat messy).

It began along the lines of thinking of Anne Shirley's classic, over-Pintrest-ed and -Instagrammed line, "I'm so glad I live in a world where there are Octobers," and how I'm glad I live in this particular October, right now, for the first time when I feel like I can actually enjoy this Princeton fall. I'm enjoying it in a way I haven't been able to before--watching the leaves slowly change color, feeling the drop in temperature day after day, witnessing the world unfurl into glory.

And in thinking about Anne Shirley, that delightful, orphaned redhead from Prince Edward's Island (who I know would rhapsodize with me about the raptures of autumn), I thought about an essay I recently read by Jia Tolentino in her book of essays entitled Trick Mirror: Reflections on Self Delusion. There are a few really profound essays in there; two which particularly hit me were her essay on girl literary heroines and how much more appealing they are as people than young adult or adult women literary heroines, and an essay called "Always Be Optimizing," which looks at the way women (in particular, though in no way limited to) are trapped in the cross-hairs of patriarchy, consumerism, the attention economy, and the ways society continues to value appearance and image as related to worth (both character-wise and net-worth-wise). Let's just say it's one of those essays that makes you take a hard look at the ways these systems both benefit and hurt you.

You might think that I might want to talk about the ways how many a childhood (including my own) was shaped by girl literary heroines (Betsy from the "Betsy-Tacy" series, Laura Ingalls from The Little House on the Prairie series, Mary Lennox from The Secret Garden, and, of course, the indomitable Anne-with-an-E Shirley from her eponymous series), but you would be wrong. What I really want to ask is:

Do we think Anne Shirley would have an Instagram account?

And if she did, how would she portray herself and her life?

We'd probably get a lot of pictures of trees. And possibly a lots of Instagram stories centering around shenanigans with Diana.

[I really do think that most of Anne Shirley's feed would be filled with trees, rivers, and lilacs and how everything is beautiful and wonderful and that the world was made for lovers.]

[I think that Princeton needs an Anne Shirley takeover, tbh]

But, in this day and age, we also would probably get a lot of selfies of a young Anne, wanting validation, wanting someone to tell her that her red hair was pretty, wanting to hear affirmation from acquaintances that she was good enough.

I don't know if Instagram would be the best thing for young Anne of Green Gables (but I still think that she would still be fun to follow, especially as she got older). I don't think it would have been good for her because of her obsession of being someone she was not; and I think something like Instagram would have hurt her ability to find out who she truly was, as it would bombard her with a curated vision of the Ideal Woman.  

In her "Always Optimizing" essay, Jia Tolentino talks about the idea of the ideal woman--how she is always generic: She always has glossy hair, a fit body, a personal brand, a validating boyfriend or husband, and she is always "optimizing," or, in Tolentino's words, "She takes advantage of technology, both in the way she broadcasts her image and in the meticulous improvement of that image itself. [. . .] Everything about this woman has been preemptively controlled to the point that she can afford the impression of spontaneity and, more important, the sensation of it--having worked to rid her life of artificial obstacles, she often feels legitimately carefree" (64).

But this optimization is not just for successful models or Instagram influencers, and, as Tolentino points out, mainstream/pop feminism hasn't eradicated the idea of the "ideal woman, but rather, has entrenched it and made it trickier. These days, it is perhaps even more psychologically seamless than ever for an ordinary woman to spend her life walking toward the idealized mirage of her own self image. She can believe [. . .] that she herself is the architect of the exquisite, constant, and often pleasurable type of power that this image holds over her time, her money, her decisions, her selfhood, and her soul" (65-66).

I realize I'm now quoting the entire essay. But the ideas Tolentino talks about in this essay--about the dangers of diet culture parading under the different name of fitness/wellness culture; about the companies we devote our time, bodies, and money to in the hopes that they will make us attractive, beautiful, and valued; the questions she poses about what would happen if we could make beauty matter less were on my mind before I read the essay. And after reading the essay, those ideas, arguments, and questions have been percolating in my mind, creating semi-profound thoughts that leave before I can actually write them down and make them stick.

The world that Instagram (and other social media platforms, but especially Instagram because of its hyper-focus on images) creates changes the way I portray myself and affects how I value myself or how I value others. Although Instagram *can* be about community (and there are a few people I follow who do an excellent job of creating those communities), or sharing your life, the people who seem to be most "successful" on Instagram are those who advertise themselves. They commodify experiences, images, and their "brand" for social capital and net gains.

Since that is the successful model, it is also a very seductive model for the rest of us to follow. It's also a model that can make us feel like we have more control over the system than we really do. Because who doesn't want to fit into that perfect, flawless prototype? Many of us do want that. There is power in that. There is power and satisfaction in having an idealized profile picture, to have validation in the forms of "likes," and "loves", and it feels directly related to our worth. And it can give you the illusion that anything can be bought with this power, and that success is an individual endeavor. Can you buy anything you want in this world? Or are there things that shouldn't be bargained for? How much is our soul worth? Our time? Our relationships? If our lives just become ways to optimize ourselves, our looks, our net worth . . . is that really living?

Is beauty all that matters?

There's a scene from the 90's classic, The Swan Princess (a show which I religiously watched as a 5-year-old . . . which might explain a lot about me), in which Princess Odette and Prince Derek--who have been betrothed since their childhood and have this love-hate relationship going on--grow up (by which I don't really know how old they are when they "grow up." Sixteen? Eighteen? Twenty-one? I'm sure neither of them are over twenty-five), and they both realize that they are into each other. We are never really given Odette's reasons for suddenly liking Derek (maybe she thinks he's sensitive now? I really don't know), but we are given Derek's reasons. It's because Odette has suddenly become drop-dead gorgeous.

Derek announces to everyone that it's time to "arrange the marriage," but Odette stops him and asks him why they should get married, to which he replies (with gusto): "You're beautiful!"

"Thank you," Odette replies, "But what else? Is beauty all that matters to you?"

And then Derek makes his worldview perfectly clear by answering, "What else is there?"

[The Swan Princess. Trying to convince young girls that they should choose someone who likes them for more than their looks, but also portrays women with unattainable body standards. /via/]

I think, that for the Instagram world, beauty is and always will be what matters the most. Because even though Instagram does allow for stories and communities, it was created first and foremost for images--for beautiful, creative images, whether of a landscape, or face, or a perfectly-made slice of pizza. And when this drive for beauty meets with advertising and optimization, we enter a world where yes, beauty is all that matters. 

Realizing this doesn't mean I won't keep using social media. Or that I don't enjoy curating my digital life or enjoy watching friends curate their own digital lives. Because I do and I will. And this doesn't mean that I am anti-makeup or anti-self care (although I think we need to seriously complicate that term and decide what it means for us personally rather than just what skin care or beauty companies think it should mean for us).

But, I do not agree that beauty should be all that matters to us in our choices--of how we live, how we act, or how we view ourselves or others. And I think it is important for all of us (myself included) to critique our assumptions of beauty, which includes our consumption and social media choices. (I say consumption choices, because isn't that where we are now with social media? We consume each other's lives as they appear on screen, and we consume the products and experiences that are presented to us as the most beautiful, the most affordable, the most needed. And I know I've spent too much money on skin care products and clothes because of these seductive presentations.)

I think this critique is especially needed when social media influencers promote a certain lifestyle as "attainable" when in reality they are promoting dangerous diet culture values, or saying that "I'm just showing my normal life" when no one's normal life includes a part-time live-in nanny so that you can work on promoting your headband shop and personal brand.

This isn't a manifesto. And this is hardly as profound as that moment of clarity I had this afternoon when I knew I wanted to write something about these thoughts swirling around my head, thoughts that will continue to develop. But I can feel those swirling thoughts converging around these questions:

What would your world/worldview look like if beauty mattered less? (Either to you, individually, or to the different societies and communities you belong to?)  Or would it matter at all?

P.S. (Almost as important of a question is: What do you think Anne Shirley's Instagram account would look like?)

I felt this was important

(and since the screenshot is blurry, here it is written out:) 

Nothing Tastes as Good as Skinny Feels

Unless you count your grandmother's

cake, hand mixed while she waits for the 

sound of your breath at the door. Or if 

you consider the taste of the sea, arms

raised while you enter, salt at your lips. 

Or maybe you've forgotten the taste of 

a lover, your mouth on his skin. I ask-

have you ever tasted the cool swill of

freedom? The consuming rush of a 

quiet, radical love. 

--by Kate Baer. 

some early october observations

-this month is going too fast for its (or my) own good.

[we are now smack-dab in the middle of decorative gourd season.]

-we have a beautiful tea box given to us by a friend for our wedding, in which we store all of our packets of herbal tea. there are many different kinds: chamomile, licorice, peppermint . . . but the one i always go for is the "throat coat" kind. it just tastes the best. i wonder if we should just have a tea box full of throat coat tea.

-last week the temperature dropped forty degrees. we are now happily into autumn and autumn is good for my soul.

-i've discovered that crunching and kicking acorns is just about as delightful as crunching crisp, autumn leaves. i'm also glad that no acorns have fallen on my head yet, because that wouldn't feel very nice.

-i'm convinced that princeton just digs up trees and replants them in opportune places to try to amplify their overall arbor-y experience (which, they don't really need to do, but whatever).

[can you see that little tree just beyond the barriers? yeah. that one was just barely re-planted.]

-i had the realization the other day at a gathering of young adults that all of the buzzfeed "what jane austen character are you?" quizzes i religiously took when i was in my early twenties were all wrong. i'm not jane bennet, elinor dashwood, or even caroline bingley. i'm actually mr. darcy.

September happenings

Before September ends in an hour and a half, I wanted to get a few photos put up about the beginnings of fall. Since generals are over, I feel like a giant weight has been lifted from my shoulders, and I feel like I'm actually enjoying this East Coast fall for the first time. It's like I'm seeing clearly and breathing more deeply and I know that I'm having more fun.

Case(s) in point:

-Going up to NYC

-Exploring random parks in central Jersey: 

-Hosting parties at our apartment

-Hanging out at corn mazes and pumpkin patches

-Watching the Downton Abbey movie (which Sam crashed a Relief Society activity to watch)

-Making borscht for the first time in years. 

-And, for me, just being reminded of how beautiful Princeton is, especially in the fall. I feel like I'm watching fall come in slowly and sweetly, and I love how autumn looks on Princeton. Just how I love how autumn looks on me.