Keeping up with the Castilles: Novembering!

I have a tendency to overestimate how much I actually share about the day-to-day life around here. Even though I've told you about my new conversation partner, last month's awesome retreat, and the crazy flood at my office, there's a lot that has gone un-blogged. So here: catch up on us!

Back to School:
One of the biggest recent changes for us is the fact that hubby is back in school! Four weeks ago, he began an online Masters program in Pastoral Counseling. It's a role reversal: when we were married 2 years ago, I was the one studying until the wee hours. Now he burns the midnight oil in our front bedroom while I go to bed.

He has a pile of impressive books...

Being his in-residence editor has its perks: it lets me learn a bit about such topics as the Intertestamental Period, the Maccabean Revolution, and the Herodian dynasty. This unashamed geek is planning to pounce on those books when he's done.

You can call me "Tink"
I finally did it--I got a pixie cut!

I was so afraid I wouldn't feel girly without my hair, but it actually feels extremely feminine and bold. My only regret is that my hair is growing so fast! I don't think I was counting on this level of maintenance.

40's Fun
My new workplace is big on social events--and food. Apparently, they also are really big into costumes, which is just fine by this recovering dress-up-aholic! The theme in our office for Halloween this year was "dress as your favorite decade."
I picked the 1940's, mainly because a) I had clothes that would work, b)someone else had already picked the 50's, and c) it's vintage--what's not to love?  

Some people said I looked like a flight attendant, but others swore I looked like this lady in Captain America (minus the hat):

Ok, I'm not in military gear, but maybe? I can dream.

(Side note: my pixie cut was postponed three days so I could pull off a 40's-ish hairstyle.)

Summer photo album

How has the summer been for you?

Yes, OK, technically the dog days of heat are still blazing outside, but here in our college town, the familiar sights and sounds of a new fall semester abound. Wal-Mart is overflowing with chaotic bins of school supplies, the streets are clogged with halting freshmen (and their parents!), and a sign at the local Starbucks declares what everyone already knows: that pumpkin spice lattes are only a few months away! 

Tomorrow classes begin again, and I can't help but feel the nostalgic pull to books and backpacks and the crisp smoothness of new spiral notebooks. *Sigh* I will forever be a student on the inside. 

Looking behind, this third summer of married life has had a completely different flavor from the first two. 

Last year was a summer of mountains, car trouble adventures, friendship insecurities, and wide-flung travel. The summer before was even crazier, with our wedding, honeymoon, head-lice (ooooooh, now there's a story...), and the foreignness of navigating my new role as wife. 

Despite another trip to Italy, some deep soul-searching, a long and ongoing job search, and a few road trips in-state, this summer has had a comfortable rhythm of rest, work, and the homey pleasures that come from having frequent guests. We painted my former study room-turned-guest room, transforming it from this color...

to this. (Correct color, but not an actual picture of the room. I wish!)

And you're probably thinking, "Uhhh, yeah.  A VERY needed change, especially if people plan to SLEEP there." Yep. I agree. 

Even though our new guest room was in progress for most of the summer, several dear friends and family members blessed us by breaking it in and keeping us company. I enjoyed them so much that I barely missed the mountains! 

So here is a short picture update of our summer shenanigans, to be followed by some more thoughtful posts soon. Right now, however, I simply wanted to let my bloggy friends know we hadn't died or anything, given my looooonnng absence from this site. :)

This dear friend spent a whole weekend with us early in the summer! She tried the local frozen yogurt, went with us to the George H. Bush presidential library, introduced us to this fascinating documentary. 

The Berlin Wall came down during Bush Sr.'s presidency, and his presidential library displays a colorful, graffiti-covered chunk of the demolished barrier. 

Then came my sister and her husband! We spent an entire day in the city for a conference, and then sis and I squeezed in a quick walk before they left. The flower we found on the walk made me catch my breath. I mean, just LOOK at it! Can you believe something like this was simply growing wild, unnoticed, on a walking trail in a city park?

And then the other sister came with her boyfriend! I had to work, but the hubs took them to the famed Blue Bell factory an hour away for a tour. If you live in Texas, you must, I repeat MUST visit this place! 

The night before they left, we all went to a local coffee shop for some Harry Potter-inspired "butter beer" (actually cream soda, butterscotch syrup and heavy cream) and a card version of Monopoly. 

And of course, we painted ourselves blue for free food with the summer homegroup! (I had work the next morning, so I was excused from full blue coverage.)

We had more visitors, there were several beautiful weddings, and there were countless silly, serious, tearful moments in between, but life is not always recorded as it's lived. Sometimes the spontaneity of a moment is half its joy. The record-keeping would spoil it, rather than preserve it. So there you go: a little snapshot of our summer! 

Light hearted

My eyes are heavy, but my heart is feeling lighter than it has felt in weeks!

Part of the lightness is due to the fact that I am now a FORMER student of Texas A&M University. Yes, by the grace of God, I am done with my college degree!

As we fluttered down the hallway in our polyester robes and tassels and rounded the corner, the huge, humming stadium opened to receive us. The girl beside me gasped. "Ohmygosh--this is happening!" It reminded me a little of the moment before I walked down the aisle at my wedding.  It was certainly less emotional, but there was the same sense of moment--that I was living my own history.

My diploma!

On stage, I gave our President a high five instead of shaking his hand. This was partially because he begged the 7,000 of us to be merciful with his poor overworked hand-shaking fingers, and partially because a high five is so much more celebratory than a handshake. :)

Afterward, there were hugs and pictures and playing with the diploma tube (because apparently it makes an amazing sound if opened fast), and then my families came together to celebrate.

Seriously, I love having two families through marriage! Each is so unique and beautiful, and I felt so incredibly loved to be surrounded by all of them. Sweet, generous friends came too, offering their hugs and conversation and time and gifts to the beautiful mix until the ice cream was melting and the windows were dark.

But the lightness I feel doesn't only come from relief at being finished with a difficult season of school. It doesn't even come from being done with work for a little while, (although that is VERY welcome!) It came softly, gradually, as a different kind of weight was lifted.

To be honest, I've been more than physically tired. I've been soul-beat these days. I told Jesus, "I know you're good", but it came out more as a challenge than a statement of glad fact. I've been afraid of failing at this new season of life, terrified that friendships will flake away or that I'll spend myself into a shred of perfectionism even when there are no teachers to give grades.

But today, God told me that He is taking care of me.

As my family prayed for hubby and I, I got a picture in my head of my joyful Savior.
His face was glowing like a parent who just can't WAIT to give his child a gift, or like a master chef who was about to excitedly unveil his masterpiece to dinner guests. He was spreading a table with sparkling linen and sweet drinks and cakes and roasted turkeys and anything delicious you can imagine-all of it appearing on a bare table like a magical scene from Narnia. And all of it--amazingly--for me.

Seeing God that way melted my heart. I often subconsciously weigh myself down with standards and rules and expectations. I begin believing that God is distant until I am perfect, as if I could earn his love.

How far from the truth! Grace is undeserved by definition. If I could earn His love, it wouldn't be grace. My true "job", if it can be called a job, is to believe and receive.

²⁹ Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. ³⁰ For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.” - Jesus (Matthew 11:29-30)

24 Hours: Unplugged

Did you miss me? Probably not...I only went "unplugged" for 24 hours, so it only really affected the three people who tried to text me.

My English professor has been lecturing about Postmodernism, and she issued a challenge for extra credit: get rid of the "white noise" of gadgets, texting, and other modern distractions for twenty four hours. Afterward, she wanted us to write a summary of our experience.

Today, I took the challenge. And here is what I wrote:

[warning; this is a slightly longer post than usual. :) ]

I was excited when you issued the challenge to unplug ourselves for twenty-four hours. I reserved the right to call someone on my phone and to work on the computer for school, but I decided that “unplugged” would mean no Facebook, no YouTube, no TV or movies, no texting, no email, no blogging, and no radio. I warned my friends: Don’t text me on Tuesday; I’m going unplugged.

The day started off well, but I had to remind myself that I was not allowed to check my IPhone for the weather forecast. I guess I can just walk outside to see if I’ll need a sweater. It felt a little strange to eat breakfast without checking my email and blog statistics, but as I ate and looked out the window, I remembered again how much I love the tangy sweetness of strawberries. I also left for school on time, which has been rare in the last few weeks.

Between classes, my phone seemed to wink at me from my backpack’s side pocket. My husband and I usually text each other throughout the day, and I had to fight back the urge to send him a message several times. With my hands and attention strangely unoccupied, I began to notice details about my classmates that I’d never seen before. I felt conversational, but most of them were texting and I couldn’t catch their eyes. It made me wonder whether I put off the same vibe of inapproachability when I am fixated on my own phone’s screen.

I went to the library, and there I spent one of the most productive hours of the past month. I chose a table that had no computer so that I would have no chance to “accidentally” check my blog or email. In one hour, I wrote two letters, copied two recipes onto index cards, studied for my next class, and completed an entire Bible study. 

My mind felt calm, sharp, and focused. Usually, I am the queen of multi-tasking. I can cook dinner, do laundry, study for a test and text a friend simultaneously without breaking a sweat. But after Tuesday, I wonder if my mind was designed for single-purposed attention.

I biked home and arrived feeling hungry, thirsty, and restless. I would usually check Facebook at this time of day.  

I feel disconnected from the real world.

A split second after the thought crossed my mind I realized just how ludicrous it was. Here I was, enjoying face-to-face interactions with my husband and the solid realness of my home around me, and I was calling facebook the “real world.” And missing it. When did I make that shift?  At what point did a virtual interface with a blue and white color scheme become more real than the pile of dirty laundry in my closet or the people sitting next to me in class?

Maybe this hurry-scurry lifestyle of production, day-planners and social media has contributed to the postmodernist’s skepticism toward anything claiming to be true or authentic. If they themselves are so enslaved to the busy treadmill, so spread thin that they are unable to give themselves in a genuine way to any one thing, why would they expect something different from society at large?

After a day of being unplugged, I have mixed feelings. 

On the one hand, I enjoyed the calm that settled over my mind in the absence of “white noise”. I felt more productive, more aware, and more relational than usual, and I can see that a constant stream of media and gadget use would almost certainly insulate me from a genuine experience of real life. 

But on the other hand, I felt downright rude to ignore texts from my friends. Unless your phone is lost, or you’re dead, our instant-feedback society has come to expect near instantaneous responses when you text someone. The access we have to any person at any time has become normal—our new reality. To experience the collective reality of our interactive culture, one must forego some depth of interaction with the objective reality, and vice versa.

Since I cannot be a hermit, total absence of white noise is impossible. But in order to avoid the hopelessness and isolation of an in-genuine existence, I am determined to periodically step back, turn off my phone, and taste the strawberries. 

Homeschooled? Why yes, I was.

"Really? You were homeschooled?" 

My friend's pale eyes widened in her pretty face on Sunday night when I mentioned the fact casually in conversation. 

"How..." she faltered. "I mean, what was that like?"

I love this question, because I love dispelling the myths that all homeschoolers are awkward, or shy, or had prom in their living rooms. Some are, and some do, but in my experience, homeschoolers are some of the most fun, interesting, and mentally alive people I've known. 

One of the most interesting effects of homeschooling is that the homeschooler usually doesn't see a sharp divide between "learning time" and "play time".  The two were so intertwined and overlapped that life is learning. Mom and Dad did a great job of making school fun, and even our vacations had plenty of teachable moments.

I suddenly realized just how true this is in my life the weekend that hubby and I were visiting his family at the beach. I was playing with our nieces, and we came up with a writing game. We made a crazy list of fun topics--vacation, puppies, swimming, gymnastics, ballet--and then rolled dice to pick one. Then I set a timer for 5 minutes, gave each of us a piece of paper and pencil, and...GO!

The idea was to write as fast as you could about the topic without erasing or correcting, and see what you could come up with.

Yes, this was an exact replica of something my college prof made us do last semester.

And yes, my little nieces loved it.

The topic we picked was "swimming", and this was the result of my five minutes (unedited!):

The nearest to weightless I’ve ever been was when I was submerged in the light-flecked water of the pool at the Wycliffe Center. My goggles pressed in around my eye sockets painfully, but I didn’t care—it was a watery forest of interesting legs down there. There were fat legs, skinny legs, lumpy legs, plump baby legs kicking near the top, and the big, hairy legs of dads. Everything had a pale, greenish tint.

 I prided myself on being able to endure the pressure of the deep-end to get the diving rings. I would grab them and then come up through the pressure zones to the breathless sunlight, gasping and wiping away the hair plastered to my face. On the ride home, my nose would be stuffy with chlorine and my eyes raccoon-like from the goggles, but I was a happy girl. 










* Addendum: While I loved homeschooling, it is only one of many good educational options. It's not the perfect choice for every family. The into on this mommy's blog is an awesome perspective on the flexibility I believe parents have in this area. As she says, "this is descriptive for our lives, not prescriptive for anyone else". 

The Beginning of the End

I'm making myself laugh because there is something ironic about giving my first blog post a title like, "The Beginning of the End." No, I'm not having a mid-life crisis, and I'm not a goofy doomsday prophet. But when I was trying to capture my feelings about starting my last semester of college, it just seemed to fit. This was the first week of the last semester, and I'll never have a first week like that again. I'll have other firsts, but not a first day of school first, and it's nostalgic and bittersweet to think about it.

I have only three classes: Political Communication, American Lit Post-WWII, and Spanish 202.  Even though one of them is writing-intensive, so far, none of them threaten to eat my life. In fact, I was telling Jordan just yesterday that it feels...a little too easy?  Wow, I'm almost afraid to write that, as if I'm tempting them to become the hardest classes of my life! But really, I feel something like a baby bird who is almost too big for its shell. I'm 24 and married, but the students sitting around me in class have barely left their teen years. College has grown me and challenged me, but the assignments that would have felt like a two-ton weight when I was 21 no longer seem weighty at all. Maybe God wants to stretch me in other areas than academics this semester.  :) 

He's been doing that a lot lately, and to tell the truth, school is easier than this type of inner confrontation!  I entered the Christmas break with a big wad of anxiety in my gut about my future. To grad school or not to grad school? To do ministry or not? To strike out and get a job in my field or not? With graduation looming and profs nudging me toward a master's degree, it felt like an internal mandate to get my life figured out.

A month later, however, my heart is content to rest in Jesus and just wait for him to lead. And this is NOT my own doing; it's Jesus, showing me my crud-ugly pride in my own accomplishments and ability to do things on my own, showing me his power to direct and guide me, and gently but firmly bringing me to my knees.
 Here is the bald truth that I now recognize: I can't make myself a "success".  If I try, I will constantly be looking sideways, measuring myself by the women of God around me. I'll be my own harshest critic--and believe me, I'm brutal when it comes to me.

But our God is so gentle with me. He is so gentle with us.  He loves us too much to leave us to ourselves, and He knows that the things I cling to--pride, people's approval, achievements--are really poisonous to the beautiful things He wants to do in me.

Please be praying for my heart to be soft.