I took a daycation today. I have been really down and depressed, and a recent decision I had to make has taken me off the charts on the sadness scale. So…I took a vacation for a day!

How does one take a daycation? Well, I chose to begin my day by sleeping in. The kids spent the night with Chris last night, and he took them to school, picked them up, and kept them all day today. I slept until about eight thirty. After waking up, I ate a bowl of cereal, and then went back to bed and read a couple chapters of a book. I made it to the shower by about ten thirty, got dressed, and went to the salon. I was thrilled that they were running a $29 mani/pedi special. When I went inside, there was no wait, and they were playing a song by one of my favorite singers (Adele). I finished my book while getting my pedicure, and my nails looked fabulous after the first manicure I’ve had in over a year. I was feeling rather spoiled.

I then left town and headed toward Knoxville. I chatted on the phone with Amy Jo all the way there, and decided to have lunch at Genghis Grill. I had only ate there once before, so it was still kind of a new experience. If you’ve never been there, it’s a Mongolian stir fry place where you fill a bowl full of uncooked meat, veggies, spices, and sauces of your choice, and then they cook it for you and serve it over a starch (rice, noodles, potatoes, etc.). It was really yummy, and I enjoyed it immensely, even without any companionship. Normally, I don’t like doing things alone. In the last couple of months, however, I’ve gotten comfortable with doing some stuff on my own, and have even found it relaxing and enjoyable.

After an early dinner at Genghis Grill, I drove to the artsy theater in West Town and saw the movie, “The Way”. I wasn’t sure what to watch, but I am glad I chose the movie I did. It was really good, and kind of comforting somehow, too. The movie was about a father who sets out on a pilgrimage to a holy site to finish the trek where his son had died shortly after beginning. The father walks across France and Spain spreading his son’s ashes one handful at a time along the way. It was pretty moving, and the location was beautiful. I have added making that pilgrimage myself to my bucket list.

After the movie, I went to the nearby mall. However, I wasn’t taking into consideration that it was Halloween. There were kids in costumes in every congested walkway of the mall. It was kind of depressing actually. Children were simply filing past every store with their hands out where they were given candy by an unenthusiastic employee. I got a cinnabon and left. I ate it in the van while talking to my friend on the phone, and I enjoyed it much more than had I stayed among the vampires and princesses and other assorted trick-or-treaters.

Finally, the cherry on the top of my lovely daycation…a trip to Barnes & Noble. I love bookstores so much. I could easily spend hours and hours in a bookstore. I wandered the aisles for a bit before choosing a book to sit down in a comfy chair to read for a while. I was really enjoying the book, and intend to check it out of my library tomorrow. I perused the bargain books where I scored a $9.95 copy of “Sacred Places: Sites of Spiritual Pilgrimage from Stonehenge to Santiago de Compostela”. I was kind of excited because, among other sacred places, it included the “Way of St James”…Santiago de Compostela…that the movie I watched was about. I also bought some pretty stationary. I stood and coveted a beautiful, leather journal made in Italy for a few minutes. It smelled so wonderful and was, oh, so beautiful. It was thirty bucks, though. So, I will have to return another day to smell the leather and imagine having thoughts beautiful enough to right down in such a book.

When I finally left the bookstore and headed home to my babies, I felt exceedingly better than I had started out the day feeling. I’m really glad I decided to indulge in a day of temporary hedonism. It did wonders for my spirit. I highly recommend a daycation every now and then. With or without a friend, it’s nice to take a day and just immerse yourself in things you enjoy. Try it! I think you’ll like it.

‎”There is a fresh I-don’t-care-ness that accompanies belief in the gospel. Whether you like me or not doesn’t matter, because my worth and my dignity and my identity are anchored in God’s approval. Christ won all of the approval and acceptance I need.”
–Tullian Tchividjian

Abby Jo, to me, on the kids’ first day of school: “We’re going to miss our children, Mommy.”

Yes, indeed.

Today was the kids’ first day of public school. There should be a picture here of the three of them, but I forgot to take it. I intended to. I had thought about it. I just forgot because they were rushing me so much. They were so excited, and could not wait to get there!

I had been worried about Elijah not adjusting well. He is so very shy and quiet. Yesterday, though, I took them to be tested to make sure they were where they should be, and, after he finished his tests, he kept saying, “I hope we can start tomorrow! Do you think we can start tomorrow?” I told him I didn’t know, but I didn’t really think they would. They did, though, and the kids couldn’t have been happier about it.

I need to stop this narrative right here, though, and brag shamelessly. While the kids were testing, I was mentally biting my fingernails in nervousness. If they didn’t test well, it would be my fault for not being a better teacher. So, when Owen tested right where he should be, I breathed a sigh of relief. When Elijah tested right where he should be, I heaved a huge sigh of relief. Then, when they told me that Kyra reads at an eighth grade level, I took a bow. My little smartypants tested into the accelerated reading AND math classes. I was so proud of her. Alright…end brag.

So, anyway, after their testing was over yesterday, we met their teachers and saw where their classrooms are. Then, we had to go to Walmart and spend a ton of money on school supplies, backpacks, and lunchboxes. While the kids were at Awana last night, Abby and I went back to Walmart and bought lunch stuff. Starting school minus back to school sales is expensive!

This morning, the kids practically leaped out of bed when I woke them up (two or three hours earlier than they woke up for homeschool). Elijah sleeps on the top bunk in the boy’s room, and he sat up and swung himself over the bed before he had really opened his eyes. He was grinning from the moment he woke up. They were dressed in about two minutes, and helped me pack their lunches. Then, they took turns saying, “Is it time to leave yet? Can we just go ahead and go?” for the next thirty minutes. Fun times.

When I picked them up from school today, they were all still happy. I was so glad. I worried off and on all day about how they were doing. At one point, I actually prayed that no one (not going to name any shy kids here) would pee their pants because they were too shy to ask to go to the restroom. I made each one of them give me a play by play of their day. Kyra loved everything and made a “favorite friend” first thing this morning. She was stoked because her and her friend, Cheyenne, are in every class together. Elijah loved math and said he already knew twelve boys from football. He also said he made a new friend, a boy who was funny but Elijah didn’t remember his name. Owen reported that his teacher got mad when he was too loud, he liked recess and technology lab, and that there were five pretty girls in his class.

So, all in all, a great day. The kids all went to bed tonight by nine with no protesting. They were anxious to go to bed so that it would be time for school again. We’ll see how long that lasts…

Tomorrow, I’ll try to get a picture. Thank you all for your prayers for their transition. So far, so good!

I have finished the fifty-first book in my Epic 100 Book Attempt of 2011!

Higher Ground: A Memoir of Salvation Found and Lost by Carolyn S. Briggs consumed me for most of the night last night. I picked up the book at about eleven o’clock last night, and didn’t lay it down until four a.m. Even then, it was a pragmatic decision that I needed to get at least a little bit of sleep, since I had to get up hours earlier than normal today. Normally, I would have finished the book in one sitting. I was captivated by the familiarity of the story that Briggs told.

“Higher Ground” is the story of Briggs life and spiritual journey. We follow her from a very modest beginning, the daughter of a blue collar man and depressed mother in Allentown, Iowa, to being the wife of an elder in a fundamentalist church, and, eventually, to her departure from the fundamentalist lifestyle altogether. Briggs writes brilliant prose whose authenticity is apparent from the first page. You can’t help but feel what she felt as you read about her falling in love, embracing motherhood, and surrendering her life, in the truest sense of the phrase, to Jesus. Briggs is a very good writer, and “Higher Ground” is a very good book.

I know that I may be biased toward loving this book, because so much of it echoes my own experiences of embracing and then stepping away from fundamentalism. I hadn’t experienced fundamentalism in the exact same way Briggs did…her brand had a decidedly hippie flavor…but I could relate to everything she wrote about. If I didn’t experience it myself, I knew people like the ones she described. It was very familiar to me.

A while back, I reviewed another book written as a memoir of someone who had left a fundamentalist life, “Churched: One Kid’s Journey Toward God Despite a Holy Mess”, and had a very different take away. I didn’t like that the author of “Churched” spoke so critically and mockingly of everything he had encountered within fundamentalism. I grew up in it, and I know that there is a lot of good in it. There are a lot of really good people in fundamentalism. I felt like he had slighted both his readers and those he wrote about. I didn’t get that feeling at all with Briggs. She managed to write an honest memoir about a sect of Christianity that she had came of age in, embraced and felt at home in, and ultimately turned her back on, without sounding bitter or mocking. I really appreciate that.

The only thing I didn’t like about “Higher Ground” had nothing to do with Briggs’ writing, but only a lingering sadness that she had equated leaving fundamentalism with leaving God. Sad because I wonder if she knows that it doesn’t have to be that way. She wrote very convincingly of being saved and filled with the Spirit. It’s obvious that she has a very genuine and deep understanding of the Bible. I just wish that she had realized that there are a lot more genuine believers outside of fundamentalism than her fundamentalist church had led her to believe. I find myself wanting to pray for Carolyn Briggs. That she would, as her pastor responded to her church membership resignation by saying, “find what she was looking for”. I hope she finds a God who loves her and accepts her…as a deep thinker, a woman, and a believer. I hope she finds that He has been there all along, and has not tired of her search for satisfaction and belonging.

I pray for her because I, too, am searching for a place to belong. A place where my faith fits and I am accepted. I know that place is not inside of a fundamentalist church. I have tried so hard to conform to that mold, but I just don’t fit. And that’s okay. God has promised to never leave me, and I believe that promise. I am so thankful that I don’t feel the same terror and despondency that she felt in leaving fundamentalism, because I know that leaving a fundamentalist lifestyle is not the same thing as leaving God.

I have finished the forty-ninth book in my Epic 100 Book Attempt of 2011!

Missing Mom by Joyce Carol Oates was an intriguing novel about a mother-daughter relationship, a family, and a tragedy. When Nikki Eaton’s mother dies unexpectedly, her world is turned upside down. Things she believes to be true are found to be entirely different. She learns things about her family that she never would have learned if she had not lost her mother. She learns things about herself that she could not possibly learn without experiencing the tragedy of losing her mom.

The emotion in Oates’ writing resonates with me. I find myself marveling at the words and phrases that Oates uses. I greatly admire her writing style. This is the second novel I’ve reviewed by Oates since beginning this reading adventure. I also reviewed “The Gravedigger’s Daughter”. Of the two, I liked “The Gravedigger’s Daughter” better than “Missing Mom”. Whereas the first one left me dying to know more about the characters, “Missing Mom” came to a tidy conclusion that gave the book a sense of closure. I don’t know which feeling is better to have when finishing a book. They were both wonderfully written novels, and I am a big Joyce Carol Oates fan.

I also finished the fiftieth book of the year, which was a topical, non-fiction book.

For the last ten years, I have been a stay at home mom. I quit my job as a CRA at Food City when I was pregnant with Kyra because I had severe morning sickness. The only work that I’ve done outside of the home since then was a short stint as janitor at a church I went to and the volunteer work I did at Choices. Needless to say, I don’t have much of a resume.

With divorce on the horizon, I’m having to think a lot about what’s next. What am I going to be? What am I going to do? How am I going to support myself? Right now, I am staying at home with Abby, even after the other kids start school, and Chris is still paying all the bills and supporting the whole family, but that won’t last forever. I am going to have to “do” something.

My highest priority right now, in this area, is finishing school. I know that if I am ever going to be able to support myself and my kids without depending on outside assistance, I must finish school. When I started back in 2006, my plan was to be a counselor. While I am still interested in psychology, I think I am going to change my major. My literature professor during my last semester encouraged me to change my major to English, and I think that is what I am going to do. My hope is to one day teach English at the college level. Right now, I’m trying to figure out how to make that happen. Teaching English is how I hope to eventually pay the bills.

My dream, though, is to be a writer. I have wanted to be a writer since I was a little girl. I have been writing since I was a little girl. I have stacks of stories that I wrote from the time I was twelve until I was fifteen. Pages upon pages of (not very good) poetry. Point being, I write. I want to write well. I believe I’ve improved a lot since starting college. I’ve had two different professors who really invested in my writing and another who really encouraged it. I’ve started to think that, someday, maybe I will realize my dream. In the meantime, I write.

While I am going to focus on school rather than a job right now, I am throwing around the idea of self-publishing a book of poetry and short stories as a Kindle book. A lot of aspiring writers have done quite well doing this, and I am loving the idea of being able to generate a modest amount of income by writing and selling Kindle books. I might make ten bucks after my mom, best friend, and little brother buy my book, or I might make a decent amount if some of my other friends read it and recommend it to someone else. I can only find out if I try, though, so I think I’m going to.

What do you guys think? Are you at all interested in reading more of what I write, or is this blog all you can handle of me? Leave me a comment. I really want to know!

I asked Abby, “Do you know you’re pretty?”
Abby: “Yeah.”
Me: “How do you know?”
Abby: “I just jumped…and then I was pretty.”

This is not an easy thing to say, but I need to say it so I can get past the major writer’s block here on my blog. Please be kind in any comments you leave for me. I am hurting, and I don’t need to be kicked. I probably already know why you think it is wrong just as well as you do, anyway. That said…

Chris and I have split up. We have been separated for two months. We are going to get divorced, but we decided yesterday to stay separated for an extended period of time so that, when we do actually get divorced, I will be in a better position than I am now to take care of myself and the kids. It was Chris’ idea to wait. He doesn’t want to get divorced. I agreed to wait because it is beneficial to me and the kids to wait. I will not be blogging about the reasons behind the decision to get divorced. I have already heard from several people who think I’m a very bad person. I will not defend myself by making known things which are no one’s business but ours. I do not want things said to my children that they do not need to know about. I appreciate all of you who already knew about our situation who have reached out to me in kindness. I appreciate those of you who think I’m terrible but have refrained from telling me so. I also appreciate those of you who will respond to this post in kindness. I am definitely learning who my real friends are through this ordeal.

There have been and will be a lot of transitions for our family. The decision to divorce does not take away our family ties, nor would we wish it to. Chris and I have four beautiful children together, and we will do everything in our power to protect their hearts and raise them to love God and love people. We appreciate your prayers…especially prayers for the children. They are going to start public school for the first time in the next week or so. Remember them as you pray that they will adjust well to the differences.

I thought about closing comments on this post, but have decided to leave them open. I am going to trust the good in people to prevail over the desire to “preach”. I’m not going to be blogging anymore specifically about the separation or divorce. I simply wanted to clear the air and not have to worry about what I blog. It’s known that Chris and I are living separate, and I think that’s all that needs to be said. I will however continue to blog my life. Sometimes it feels like this situation is my life, but it’s not.

The righteous cry out, and the LORD hears them;
he delivers them from all their troubles.
The LORD is close to the brokenhearted
and saves those who are crushed in spirit.

The righteous person may have many troubles,
but the LORD delivers him from them all;
he protects all his bones,
not one of them will be broken.

Evil will slay the wicked;
the foes of the righteous will be condemned.
The LORD will rescue his servants;
no one who takes refuge in him will be condemned.

I have finished the forty-seventh book in my Epic 100 Book Attempt of 2011!

Unplanned by Abby Johnson is a very thought-provoking book. This book tells the story of Abby Johnson, a former director of a Planned Parenthood clinic, who, during an ultrasound-guided abortion she was helping with, realized the brutality and horrific reality of what abortion really is and had to face the dichotomy between her Christian beliefs and her position within the pro-choice culture. She ended up “switching sides” and became an advocate for the Pro-Life movement.

I feel like this book has the potential to make a LOT of people angry, but it will also have the effect of making people think. Johnson is very honest about her own life, including her decision to have two separate abortions herself. She is honest about her struggle differentiating the work that Planned Parenthood does that is legitimately beneficial to women’s health and the work that they do that costs millions of babies their lives. This book is also an inside look into the organization through the eyes of a clinic director.

I recommend this book. It was worth the read.

I also finished my forty-eighth book which was a topical, non-fiction book.