He moves in mysterious ways

The element of surprise, when over time we morph into a new person and only upon looking back see the gradual transformation, is a gift I continue to unwrap these days leading up to the biggest change of all.  Marriage.  Indeed, it has brought tears of delight, tears of remembrance, utterances of gratitude, and many chuckles.  I thought I knew myself so well.  I thought I wouldn't change, not this much.  God really has a sense of humor.

I didn't know how much I needed liberation.

Though in a much different context, the words of Lilla Watson, aboriginal activist, poignantly describe my personal road to transformation: "If you've come to help me, you are wasting your time.  But if you have come because your liberation is bound up with mine, then let us work together."

The girl who, admittedly, never gave a Mexican man a second glance will be married to the most amazing of these men by the end of next month.

The girl who only had dreams of Africa and aspirations of speaking Swahili now dreams of life in Mexico and fluency in Spanish.

The girl who thought for many years what she wanted and needed most was a man with a Pentecostal faith, drawn to a man of Catholic faith and finding richness in more traditional expressions of the faith.  

The girl who would only consider marrying a man who wanted to "do ministry," in love with a brilliant businessman and entrepreneur whose capability of dreaming, taking risks and making things happen challenges to no end her previous definitions of "potential."  This girl, realizing that ministry is about who you are and how you love the ones around you, not where you live or what your position is.  

The girl who once believed it necessary to marry a partner of "equivalent" spiritual knowledge and experience, humbled by the revelation of her own spiritual pride, marveling instead in the endless opportunities to learn more about God and experience him through the differences of another, rather than in sameness.  

The girl who thought the only acceptable place to live, if one cared anything about the poor, was with the poor, now living in an apartment in the well-to-do Mercer Island; reflecting not a rejection of responsibility to love and care for the poor, but a rejection of the narrowness of expression of that love.

The girl who once lived as if what she did with her life - education, career, ministry - were the most definitive of her value, working in a job that requires no education and receives little admiration from society as a "meaningful" or "serious" employment.   This girl, learning here to esteem love and service above resume building.  

The girl who agonized over her inability to love God perfectly, learning to marvel instead at the perfect love of God and the impossibility of earning it.  

It's no wonder this girl needed to wait so long to have a heart open to receive a man like Ricardo.  She wasn't ready for the changes.

I have no doubts, as this girl, that the wait will be worthwhile.  It already has been.  God moves in mysterious ways.

Our not-so-traditional photo shoot

Compliments to our lovely, talented photographer, Mandy Fiock!  This photo shoot was a hoot and a memory we will cherish for years to come...

Lent: a season of gifts

I love the season of Lent.  Unlike Christmas, it's not been drenched in commercialism.  It feels almost untouched by the culture of consumerism - a welcome breath of fresh air.  Lent is a season of passion.  Of conviction.  Of re-thinking the way we do life and realigning with God's way of doing life.  It's a season of pursuit, of humble restraint, of extravagant feasting on love.  For forty days leading up to the great celebration of Easter Sunday, anticipation mounts in my heart as the cobwebs are cleared away and I focus on what - Who - is really important.  It's all about Jesus.


Perhaps this is one reason I am excited to be getting married in April, following on the heels of Lent's close.  What better gift have I been given right now than the gift of focusing my heart and mind on Jesus, the one Ricardo and I honor as the center and foundation of our relationship, and soon, our marriage?  The opportunity of pursuing Christ together in the final weeks leading up to Easter and to our wedding?  The pure joy of allowing Jesus to capture our hearts in a deeper way before we exchange our vows of love to each other?  


These are gifts beyond value.  I hope and pray I can hold them with great care and attention.  




 

The good land

Being a city girl, I don't always notice the moon until it hits me square between the eyes, bared in its otherwordly glory. Like tonight. I'm cruising up 46th Ave toward Fremont , and just over the crest of the hill, I see something so enormously bright and round hanging in the sky. The moon. It seems like a rare moment to catch it like this, and I'm unprepared for it. So overcome by wonder, I proclaim in my car to God's ears alone, a thirty-one year old wide-eyed toddler: "Look Papa... the moon!"

It's gifts like these that bring me to my knees, make me feel so small and yet so significant. Tonight, I saw the moon and captured it in my heart.


I read a verse yesterday from the bible that I've continued to read and reread, so profound it is: "And you shall eat and be full, and you shall bless the Lord your God for the good land he has given you" (Deuteronomy 8:10). I've heard a lot of talk in churches, in songs, in conversations over the years about this notion of "God has been so good to me." It sounds right, but over time I'm slowly getting it, that it's not about my perception of God's goodness toward me that makes him good. He just is good. When the moon rises full and ripe, he is good. When the winds blow and the rains drench, he is good. When I have a job, he is good. When I collect unemployment, he is good. When there is war, he is good. And when the troops pack up and go home, he is good. It really doesn't have anything to do with circumstances. The trick for me is learning to see the landscape of my life as a "good land," be it dry and barren or rich and fertile, and to thank God always.


Right now, I'm in a particularly sweet season of life. I can readily identify with the idea of eating until I'm full and blessing God for this good land he's given me. The beautiful Ethan Allen dining table and chairs, which we named Henry, found on Craigslist for fifty dollars. My friend's excitement, creativity and generosity, making us a wedding cake as our gift. Another friend with a passion for wedding coordination, helping us with all the nitty gritty details. A check arriving in the mail from a dear friend, a large sum, to donate toward helping Ricardo's friends make the trip to Seattle for the wedding. A church, whose pastors were friends with my dad when he was alive, letting us rent the entire building for a minimal fee and treating us like family. Our photographer, also a friend of ours, providing us with a highly personalized engagement photo shoot as our wedding present. The owner of my favorite goat farm, allowing us access to all her animals for the pictures. Another generous check arriving in the mail from old family friends, to help cover expenses. Five days of straight sunshine in February. Breakfast with one of my closest friends and free babysitting so we could enjoy this rare occasion. A dear friend flying out for the weekend from California to spend time with me and celebrate my engagement. Ricardo's sister, designing elegant wedding invitations as her gift to us. An equisite wedding gown, in my size and my price range, on the first day of looking. A fiance who works diligently with me and on his own to plan our wedding and prepare for our life together. A mom who has saved up and invested to help us pay for this celebration.


The list rolls on and on, trust me, but I think we get the point.


God is good and I thank him for this sweet season and this good land - and I thank him for the moon. But really, it's not about the gifts themselves. It's the love behind the gifts that gets to me. They are all unnecessary, and still, he gives.


He is the good land.

the beginning of an eclectic collection

There are all kinds of styles for decorating: modern, shabby chic, vintage, americana, country farmhouse, ultra elegant, victorian, western, eco-friendly, minimalist, 

retro, Chinese feng shui, Japanese zen, 

Martha Stewart (who gets her own category of style), to name a few.   

My style has evolved over the years, but one thing has remained steadfast: 

I am eclectic.   

I love color, vibrant and cheery, which explains in part why it's been so easy for me to

 fall in love with Mexican things - cosas Mexicanas.   

I love animals, old things, chili peppers, and the colors red, yellow, green and purple.  

Thankfully, so does Ricardo - or at least, he loves me.

My birthday present: a large popcorn (or snack) bowl,
handpainted by Ricardo and I

The cabra 

Treasured finds at Goodwill: guacamole and salsa bowls

A little bit of eclectic: thanks to Ricardo for letting me
indulge in these ceramic crab plates,
the essential vegetarian serveware.

Our Mexican kitchen collection grows

The beautiful bag my cousin Erica, who lives in Mexico,
made for me: a birthday gift from Mom.
*Check Erica out on Etsy: http://www.etsy.com/shop/EricaMaree?ref=seller_info

Livin' la vida loco

I feel apologies are in order to you, my readers.  There we were, finally getting into a groove together, and I went M.I.A. on you.  I plummeted from writing five days a week to once every week or two.  Jeepers, I'm really sorry.


I do, however, have a fantastic excuse for this abandonment, if you can forgive me.  I'm getting married.  I think I made that clear, indirectly, in my last two posts, but in case you didn't read those, well, there it is.  Ricardo proposed to me on New Year's Eve and made me one very happy girl, and now we're crazily planning a wedding in less than four months.  It's been two weeks of engagement now, and we've hunkered down together to check quite a few biggies off our list:


Date (check)
Place (check)
Budget planning (check)
Bridesmaids (check)
Bridesmaids dresses (check)
Live band (check)
DJ (check)
Caterer (check)
Bridal gown (check)
Veil (check)
Mother of the Bride dress (check)
Dessert caterer (check)
Gathering addresses (check)
Start of invitations (check)
Honeymoon flight tickets (check)


Yeah, I couldn't fathom doing this on my own.  I'm incredibly thankful that Ricardo is every bit as crazy as I, and that he's not one to check himself out of the planning process.  He's in with me, shoulder to shoulder, and for that I thank God every day.  It's already been an amazing experience to share with each other.  


All that to say, I've been just a tad bit busy.  I will be scaling back, evidently, to between two and four posts a month for this season.  But I'll be back, when life settles, refreshed and ready to share my beautiful rubbish with you all. 


I may not be writing as much, but let me tell you, it's going to be a season of learning to put into practice full throttle what I've been writing and learning for over a year.  Slowing down...and down...to look for the beautiful in each day, so it's not passing me by in a blur.  


I wish you the best in your own journey of beautiful rubbish.  Keep checking in - I'll still be here.  

Feliz cumpleaños, mi Ricardito

One of the best gifts I’ve received was born five years before I ever existed.  Born in Mexico City, charcoal eyes and curly black hair, my fiancé, Ricardo, grew up sandwiched between two sisters with the same set of mesmerizing eyes, with two hardworking laywers for parents.  At the age of five, the family moved five hours north to  Aguascalientes, a tamer city than the mecca of Mexico’s capital, but he still grew up tough and street saavy.  As a child, he attended private Catholic schools, growing up with the same group of kids, excelling in soccer, going on to study computer engineering at the university.  By the age of twenty-one, he was moving up in a world-renowned organization, based in his town, but left it all behind to start his own company before even graduating college.  I didn’t learn this until recently, but he disliked the company’s ethics, the pressure to compromise, the environment of people trying to buy his loyalty.  So he politely dismissed himself and pioneered a competing company.

Seven years ago, he made a daring move to Seattle, traveling by train from San Diego with fifty dollars and no English to start a new life from scratch.  Now he owns his own graphic design company.

And then, there’s me.  I grew up as the youngest child of two girls, a pastor’s daughter, with a mom who stayed home most of our growing up years.  We moved around every three or four years - Phoenix, Portland, Richland, St. Helens, and back to Portland - but always lived in safe neighborhoods.  I attended public school, played sports and went on to study psychology in college and grad school.  I’ve never lived outside the country and I studied Spanish for just two years in high school.  Before meeting Ricardo, I’d attended Catholic mass one time and was generally ignorant of the Catholic way of worship.  But I’d branched out enough to dip my toes in the waters of latin dance and fell in love, just before meeting him.   

Everyone walks a different journey, lives out a different timeline of life events.  If you’d asked me at twenty-one when I thought I’d be married and to what kind of guy I thought that’d be, I would have said no later than twenty-five and to some white guy who grew up a lot like me.  Maybe that’s one advantage of marrying later.  I’ve had my entire twenties, a winding road of exploration and discovery, to see who the real me is.  And how different, in many ways, that person is from who I thought ten years ago.  My world, over the last decade, has stretched with each passing year, and with it, my view of life and people and God.   

I never imagined the man I’d marry would have grown up in a Catholic family in Mexico.  I wouldn’t have been ready for him at twenty-one, or twenty-five, or twenty-eight.  But I am now.  My heart is open and ready to receive the beautiful differences of this incredible man, and in the process, to discover all the things we share beneath our different skins and backgrounds.    

It’s his birthday today, but I’m the one to open the gift.  Thank you, God.