I’m a very sentimental person and tend to attach deep meaning to all sorts of seemingly frivolous things. As such, there are two “big” decisions that I always anticipate with great apprehension…new journals and new eyeglasses.
After nearly a decade of relatively consistent journaling, I’ve got journal shopping down to a science. I can estimate almost to the day how long it will be before I need a new journal, and I give myself at least a week to find a new one. I know it shouldn’t be that hard, but it’s a big deal. Some of it has to do with how particular I am…right size, right paper, right line width (although blank paper has been my most recent choice), and not to mention what the cover looks like. I can confess that on more than one occasion, the deciding factor has come down to things like smell or the texture of the paper.
I justify all this fuss because, in many ways, the words that each journal holds are an extension of my heart and soul. Yes, many times the pages are filled with stories of my daily life. But the reason I journal so diligently is to continue telling myself the story of God’s faithfulness. Most of the words are prayers cried and prayers answered. And so I imagine the journals I choose as prayers themselves. A new journal is literally the beginning of a new book, a new volume, a new chapter of my life. (Only on two occasions have I bought a new journal without finishing the current one…both times it was because of a break-up.) In a season of significant growth, the journal I chose looked like tree bark…praying for more growth to continue. In a season of heartache, I chose a journal covered in small birds and fruit…praying that I would come to know the freedom of a bird not caged, and praying that I might be a fruit-bearing tree. And in this most recent season of great uncertainty and transition, the blank white pages of my journal have spoken not only to my most vulnerable anxieties of the future, but also the infinite hope of possibility. (Sometime I’ll write more on blank white paper…)
So about once a year, my dear, dear mom oh so patiently ventures to Barnes and Noble with me and we stand before the wall of journals praying for the stories and memories and prayers that will fill one of those empty books.
Much like journal shopping, choosing new glasses presents about the same level of complexity. Fortunately, I only shop for glasses every few years. The last time was just before I started my first year of college. The decision to choose the orange and purple frames proved a very decisive moment…in a deeply symbolic way, I was relinquishing the years of being known by my love for orange. (Love is an understatement. For several years, I insisted upon wearing something orange every day. My walls were—and still are—orange. My furniture was—and still is—orange. Orange, orange, orange always and forever.) Orange, of course, meant all sorts of things other than color. I let it articulate my desire to be different, my acceptance of quirkiness, and it paired well with my nickname “Spunky.” Purple, seemed like a little more subtle version of all those desires…still lively, but maybe a little more mature…or at least that’s how it all seemed when I was fresh out of high school and preparing to move all the way to California.
Today, it was time for new eyeglasses. So my dear, dear mom oh so patiently ventured with me to pick out new frames. I had to have tried on at least 30 or 40 pairs, which we slowly whittled down to 10 and then 4 and eventually there were only 2 left. Again, I know full well that no other person will ever infer all the meaning that I see in any pair of glasses frames, but there was an extensive deliberation in choosing between those last two frames. One said “past”; one said “future.” One seemed like the perfect, funky, just-graduated-from-college-and-am-totally-confident-enough-to-wear-whatever-kind-of-glasses-I-want frames. The other was the I-just-graduated-from-college-and-am-still-young-and-adventurous-but-also-ready-to-begin-my-life-as-a-somewhat-sophistacated-professional. The first would be totally California fashionable. The latter were more classic and surely acceptable anywhere—probably even Hazlehurst, Mississippi. And so off and on each pair went. This mirror, that mirror, hair up, hair down. Walk around the store for a few minutes and try them again with fresh eyes. And as I stood in front the 2nd mirror from the left (the one with the best lighting), my mom started asking the questions to unravel all the tangled thoughts and anxieties that I had attached to this relatively insignificant decision.
Looking into the mirror, I started praying the same prayer that I pray when looking for journals and the same prayer that I’ve prayed during all my “new teacher clothes-shopping.” I realized that no set of glasses frames or new dress or new journal will really be able to tell me who I am, nor will they really shape who I become. Yes, in some small way they are an articulation of my fashion or style or personality, and maybe even a little of my heart. But on their own, they can’t say all that I’m asking them to say. So stepping a little closer to the mirror, I tried to look beyond their plastic glass and ask my eyes what my heart and soul were saying. And they again spoke of the terrible tension of this season…all the pain and heartache and excitement and hope that come with leaving and going. They confessed again how desperately I wish I was going back to Azusa in three months, and how terrified I am of the world that lies on the other side of the River. And then they begged me to let go just a little more, with the hope and promise of having more hand space for the good things to come.
After tearing up for just a second, I chose the pair of glasses that will give me new vision in my new life—hopefully new vision in more ways than one!
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