my promised land

it's so quiet.

sunday, midday. in the hour before the catholic church lets out and whips up their weekly spanish party with an ice cream truck that plays "pop goes the weasel" at breakneck speed for 30 minutes, it's incredibly quiet.

i've weathered more than two months of clamorous, frenetic thoughts hounding me every moment i'm not working or sleeping to, "find a job! find a job! find a job!" i'm at once frantic and apathetic, eager for it to be too late at night to continue working so i can finally let myself have a break. my mind is pretty frenetic anyway. it's always telling me something i should be doing (which is rarely what i am doing), but after a good cry in church--the only place i know where you can have a good, private cry in a room of people and no one thinks it's strange--i came home to a very quiet apartment building. my mind is quiet too. it feels like the movie is paused, and i can live in the stillness for a few minutes.

i haven't found a job.
so...that sucks.

in processing this, i think, "i'm glad i didn't get a cat. i'm glad i'm not a single mom." i'm thankful no one is depending on me, but i'm also sorry i don't have someone with whom to travel through this. my mom has been doing a great job long distance, and i have terrific friends, but it's difficult to need something that takes time, and very humbling, because people get tired of you needing it. most people are, on some level, repelled by need. we don't know what to do, how to encourage, when we can't see change.

often i've been asked cheerfully, "so, how's the job hunt going?" which is, 99% percent of the time, super discouraging to answer unless it's over! i wish people would just ask, "how are you doing?" what runs through my mind is, "how can you be so cheerful? this feels desperate! i am the only person in my life who can support me. i don't have parents with money to pinch hit if i run out. the money i do have saved, which isn't much, has come from careful budgeting. what if i use it all up and still haven't found a job that pays enough? what is to become of me?!" of course most people don't know all that, and it isn't really an appropriate burden for them to bear; it's mine.

one of my goals in this journey has been to sidestep the victim mentality. God has allowed me to revisit this place (it's my third visit), and each time, the stakes are higher. this place is familiar, unfortunately, but that tells me it's a place i really need to be in order to grow. i know he wants me to learn by repetition and experience that he has me. it won't be a painless journey, because our depth and compassion grow in difficulty, but he is always here.

i also remind myself, "he is above all circumstances," which for our earthbound bodies, is so difficult to believe. i can be on my last cent, and he could change everything. for me personally, with a father who chose not to be part of my life, it is exceptionally hard to believe he would do that for me. this is something it may take a long time to fully accept, but i believe it more and more. that he treasures me, that he wants to give me the best, that he will at the right time.

mentally i try to prepare for the worst: running out of money; getting evicted; having no choice but to return to colorado, live in my mom's tiny house, and take another inane food service job. i'm already going through my belongings in my head, deciding what i'd have to get rid of (all furniture but the bed) and what i would keep (yarn, clothes, dishes). i'm weary of being impermanent. i've moved 35 times in my 35 years. my things are stored in plastic drawers because they're easy to move, but i'm dying to put down roots.

this has felt like my Promised Land, the place i've been waiting my life to find. the rolling hills with gnarled oak trees, the creative and interesting people my age, the proximity to the city and the beach; it's the landscape of my heart. i came here to stay, but what if i can't make it?

hello.
i'm reading a book called Storyline, which is about figuring out and living your best story. it couldn't be better timing for me; i've been trying to figure out my direction since i finished college, ugh, twelve years ago! i've had some opportunities little kid Lauren never would've imagined, but i feel like i'm wasting my strengths, and that drives me crazy. i'm a little proud, too. i was the "smart one" all through school, and now i'm humbled, humiliated even, by my own aimlessness.

how can i not have a dream? one vivid, undeniable dream? my original plan was to get a master's in art and become a professor, but i got stuck. painting didn't feel sustainable; it required blood. it never gave me anything back until i had finished. it was hours of doubts clutching at my throat, and i stabbed and stabbed with my brush until i finally had them on the run again.

printmaking turned out to be a place i found freedom from the doubts. there was so much process involved. i could lose myself in the details; that's all i really want to do. why didn't i study printmaking? hell, now i don't know. why not writing? i mean, this is the most fun i've had all week.

[short recess for a dance party to Low. killer bass.]

the one thing i did know when i left japan was that i wanted to move to california; it just felt like the place for me. north or south? i didn't really care, i just didn't want to be cold all of the time. i actually never thought i would make it; i'm not a risk taker. haha! two people have said to me in the last week, "i'm not a risk-taker like you," and i just have a big internal cackle. if you consider moving to japan alone without knowing the language a risk...well, i guess it did require some courage, but it wasn't a risk. i had a job and a place to live waiting for me.

this was a risk: moving my entire life to california on the promise of 6 months of part time work. it felt like my one chance, though. i had to try. i don't think it's an accident that i'm here. there is so much going on in this area that it blows my mind. i mean, so much i'm actually interested in. i would have liked more than a year to get my feet on the ground, but i believe in God's Perfect Timing. i don't think that means it will be easy or even that it will end up how i want, but when i got past crisis mode (three days ago?), i started to, like, enjoy the adventure of it. isn't that insane?

i lost my job at the perfect time; i just don't know what it's perfect for yet.

my kryptonite

i woke smelling fresh air that had forced its way through the cracks of my vintage apartment. several days of hard rain is being steamed out of the grass by unexpected sun, and the wind is just wild enough to be thrilling. trees are tossing gusts of cool humidity into the sky. sitting in a kitchen sunbeam, it's almost too hot for tea, but it tastes good anyway. today feels alive and hopeful. i can almost forget that i'm losing my hair and my job.

two weeks ago, the day i dreaded came and went; the little company where i've been working went belly up¹. as i listened to the heartbroken owner, i couldn't stop shaking. my hands, my legs, my jaw--vibrating like a Magic Fingers bed. i had to wrap my arms around my legs just to hold myself together. 

i couldn't eat. i'm the hungriest person of all time, and i couldn't get anything down. i lost two pounds in 24 hours. i couldn't sleep. i tossed around sweaty and tense with dread hanging over me like the Death Star. 

looking for a job is my kryptonite.

if stress couldn't explain before why my hair has lost its will to live, it probably can now. 

but...thanks to the support and prayers of my awesome friends, i have been living large for weeks now--eating and sleeping like i just don't care. i am absolutely uncertain about what lies ahead for me in four months time, but then, we're really all in that place together. anything can happen. 

something definitely will.

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^{1. [They have kindly given me 4 months notice.]↩}