8 little ways that Adam and I are different:

1. Adam and I both really like cereal. Adam eats his from medium-sized mixing bowls. I eat mine from medium-sized cups.

2. Adam and I both love tea. For me, a good green tea trumps all, though I’m quite fond of rooibos as well. Adam likes more classic black teas like earl grey and darjeeling.

3. Adam tends to decorate mod. I tend to decorate “cozy.”

4. Adam is great at cooking Asian food. I try, but I fail.

5. Adam likes cigars. I prefer pipes.

6. Given the choice between a lake or a letter, I would choose a letter. Adam would chose a lake.

7. Adam likes his bread soft. My favourite bread is crispy and chewy, bread that makes your teeth move.

8. Adam likes grilled cheese sandwiches the way his dad makes them, with American cheese, slathered in butter. I like mine with sharp chedder and tomatoes on sourdough, cooked in a small bit of olive oil.

Your turn. List eight ways you are different from someone.

**Note: I have a new, little “what I’m reading” list on the sidebar.  Check it out.**

I am taking a break from the large stack of drying dishes to nibble on a cheese sandwich and blog with a cup of (surprisingly appealing) lukewarm darjeeling from this morning. Ryan Adams is singing away and water is dripping outside my sunny window from the air conditioner to the apartment above us. It’s a softly active day, with a lot to do and a lot of time. For me that, is. For Adam, it is the first day of his new job. Let’s all keep our fingers crossed for him.

Today is also one month from the day we got married. Adam and I have been married a month. I like that. I like that a lot.

It’s a pleasure, dear, to be married to you. Thanks for everything.

I love going to work. Not being at work (though I often enjoy that to). I love the act of getting there. I love walking when it’s wet or cool. I love biking when it’s warm and bright. I love busing when it’s freezing. This week has been a particularly wonderful one, as far as transportation goes. I’ve biked home in a thunderstorm, smoked a nice morning pipe while listening to music, and walked to work barefoot in the pouring rain. Today, I biked to work before 6:30 in the morning when the sun was nice and young and the streets were quiet. I’ve always liked the act of getting places (as far as I can remember anyways). I like long car rides and plane rides and train rides. I like traveling, in the most literal sense of the word.

This morning, I dropped four of my five classes. I kept my Norwegian class, but if it ends up getting in the way of my writing, I’ll drop that one, too. Because that is what I’m going to do this semester; I’m going to write. I’ve wanted to do this my whole life, and I feel like the time has finally come to step out and try my writing legs. To see where it takes me.

A wise teacher of mine once wrote me this, “The difficulty is obvious: you can have a degree in international studies or Scandinavian studies, but virtually nobody can say ‘O.K. Lindsey, you are an accomplished -or, at least promising- writer now’. My modest advice is: be ready to suffer in order to make your dream real, this one is surely not an easy task, a comfortable path.” Generally, I’m not really into suffering for things. That usually implies a lot of self-discipline, which I’m not very good at. I’m not into dieting. I sleep when I should be cramming for a test. It takes me forever to do things like thank you cards. I only exercise when/because it’s fun. But now and again, I run into something that draws out the fighter in me. Writing does. It requires it. Nothing can force me to write; no one can write for me. So I’m going to give it a shot, give myself a shot. There’s a chance I’ll fail miserably.

But that’s all part of the trip, isn’t it?

I find myself torn. There is just too much to write about, today.

I want to post more wedding pictures I like. Like this one. And this one. And these two, too.

I want to talk more about the apartment. About how we managed to put up the big bookshelf, the one I helped Adam pick out on our “first date” (to IKEA). I want to tell you how great it looks with both our books, and how we’ll need to get another to house the rest of our library.

I want to tell you some things about being married, like how they are right when they say that it’s hard, but working through the hard bits is more rewarding than ever, because you know that in the long run, the guts and tears you put into working it out will make things lighter and keep crawling things from creeping into your relationship. And in the short run, it’s rewarding too, and you find yourself dancing and twirling with your husband in a coffee shop while you wait for your smoothie.

I want to talk about Yeats, poetry, personality, pilgrim souls.

But, unfortunately, all that will have to wait, because I’ve just finished the first draft of my first book. It’s sitting next to me now, open to the first page I began back when summer was still young. I thought that this would excite me. And maybe it will. But for now, it just feels strange. I don’t really want the story to be over.

That’s not to say I have nothing left to do with it. I already have dozens of things I want to carve into and big things I want to plop in. But a part of me misses writing the first draft. There is something so fun about about holding a blank page with no idea what is coming next and filling it with a story. I loved creating the characters, and places, and adventures. I really loved it! I know that the hardest work is yet to come, but if it’s half as rewarding as this first bit has been, it is so worth it.

This story is a children’s story, and it begins with two heroes, one human, one feline, who don’t know they are heroes yet. They get caught up in an adventure involving a butler, a rich old woman, a rich dead woman, a gardner, and a no-good grizzling sminks. Before they know it, they’re setting traps in mansions and eating goulash in the remote mountains of Hungary. It’s all very exciting, really. And just now, quite rough. But I can’t wait to see where draft two takes these heroes.

To An Isle in the Water, by W.B. Yeats

Shy one, shy one
Shy one of my heart,
She moves in the firelight
Pensively apart

She carries in the dishes
And lays them in a row
To an isle in the water
With her would I go.

She carries in the candles
And lights the curtained room
Shy in the doorway
And shy in the gloom;

And shy as a rabbit
Helpful and shy
To an isle in the water
With her would I fly.

I found myself reading Yeats again last night, when the flat (crowded with crates and boxes) was dark and quiet like the street. I forgot how much I like him and that certain way he says things.

The best part was that I got to read him from my very own desk in an apartment Adam and I had all to ourselves. The best part was that our food (or lack of food) was in the cupboards, and our shampoos were in the shower, and those were our crates crowding the room.

Adam and I moved into our apartment yesterday, and it feels amazing. It’s not anything special, really. Not yet. But it will be. It will be our home, filled with our days and books and treasures. Last autumn, I would always speed home from work, biking and walking as fast and my little toes could go. It wasn’t because I had something to do, I just wanted to be home in that wonderful, dilapidated, house where I knew Monica would be baking apple pie, and Janelle would be doing dishes, and we’d all eat hot cornbread and apples together, and Adam would join us and kiss me.

I haven’t rushed home like that since sometime in April when Janelle moved out. But at work today, I find my toes feeling fidgety. I can’t wait to go home. I can’t WAIT to go HOME! I might just sprint down the street.

It feels so good. It feels so, so good. I think that “home” must be the most amazing place in the entire world. There have been physical places that have moved me, changed me, and knocked me off my feet. There have been physical places so stunning, I learned more from them about God’s beauty and mystery than anything I read in any book. But to have a place right here on earth that you can bind yourself to and be yourself in, a place that is so tied to the people and moments you love- that is miraculous.

What is the most amazing place in the world? Tell me about your home. What do you like about it?

I am writing from a couch enjoying the luxury of sitting around in my pajamas, taking advantage of the roommates’ cable, and drinking blueberry juice in a quiet house in the morning. Adam and I are both morning people (and evening people, for that matter), but when we have a work/school free day, he sleeps a good deal later than I do. And that means I can watch Gilmore Girls.
We’ve been packing things and moving boxes and eating anything that doesn’t involve pans. And it’s kind of fun. But I can’t wait for us to be in our own place.

It’s been a great week. We had a cozy, wonderful honeymoon filled to the brim with long drives and amazing food. We drove up to Door County and stayed at the wonderful (wonderful.) Whistling Swan. Then we scooted across Death’s Door to Washington Island and the Washington Hotel. It’s also a culinary school that focuses on local and organic ingredients, so the food there was awesome. Even just bread (baked from the island’s wheat), butter (good stuff), and milk (so thick and fresh) was an amazing treat I couldn’t seem to get enough of. We also both really liked the quiet island. It was a lovely time.

Unfortunately, upon return, we found that our rental company made a glitch in our lease, so we are currently stuck in the bedroom of Adam’s old apartment filled to the brim with stuff we were planning to move yesterday into our new place. It makes me slightly claustrophobic at times, and hasn’t been a lot of fun in that respect. It’s been ages since I’ve had claustrophobic panic attacks, and I forgot how scary it can be, though, thankfully, these have been very mild.

But tonight, we bought a bottle of sherry to beat the claustrophobia blues. Adam smoked a cigar, and I smoked my pipe while we drank it and talked and watched the long, dark, cool rain fall. There was a soft ease to the evening despite loud music nearby. We delighted together at how the taste of tobacco and sherry melted on our tongues, the slow sips and breaths. The moment was small, but it was very sweet.

I’ve been married a week, and it has been wonderful. I relish the closeness and the safety I find here, the sweetness of being tied so tightly, the joy of embarking on something new and bright. Even as I read my vows and felt their weight in my mouth, I didn’t know that tomorrow would feel so different. I find myself surprised, yet again, by God and this world and this life, surprised by the width and depth of things. I love being surprised.

I wish you all a good night. If it’s raining, I hope it is pattering nicely outside your window while you are falling asleep.

The wedding…

was…

great!

And being married?

It’s even sweeter. It feels different, and it feels wonderful.