Choosing wonder

Congress adjourned two weeks ago tomorrow. The day after adjournment, Sarah and Peter were wed. I’ve finally been living at the new apartment full-time. All these conditions met, I expected life to feel normal – but instead, I spent many days walking around, dizzy and jarred, like the sensation you get when the roller coaster has stopped but your body hasn’t adjusted to stillness yet.

It’s strange enough in DC during an election year. In 2006, my boss didn’t even have a race, but I could still sense the anxious tension stalking the largely empty halls of Congress. This year it’s more a lingering stench of inevitability. And on top of the continued alteration in the political winds, I’ve gone through more change in my personal life over the last four months than I have since coming back to Virginia from the West Coast four years ago.

I suppose it’s a mercy of God so much has happened at once. One change after another would be terribly taxing, and a series of small changes may tempt me to idiotically believe that I could take control of the situation.

Of all the spiritual lessons from __C that stuck with me – of the ones I can articulate, at least – the one that has been the most poignant reminder of God’s sovereignty and my finiteness was the statement by one of the girls in my wing chapel that we are never more in control when we feel we have it all under control than we are when we feel wholly out of control. To put it another way, any sensation of being in control is a delusion.

So for all my criticism of those so upset about the stock market situation lately, I'm not really so different. I can smugly accuse those clinging to their golden calf of greed, trusting their own resources instead of God’s provision. But I too have an idol I crawl back to in moments of distress: the notion that this is a Leeann-centered universe, and the fact that not every detail of my life is what it once was means that I am being unfairly repressed. I shudder to recall my shameful identification with one of the “patients” described in Lewis’ Screwtape Letters: “the woman is in what may be called the ‘All-I-want’ state of mind. All she wants is a cup of tea properly made, or an egg properly boiled, or a slice of bread properly toasted. But she never finds any servant or any friend who can do these simple things ‘properly’ – because her ‘properly’ conceals an insatiable demands for the exact, and almost impossible, palatal pleasure which she imagines she remembers from the past.”

I am ashamed to recall instances in recent months when I have gone out of my way to demonstrate this heart attitude to those around me. Oh, they don’t all involve proper food preparation, though there was the barbeque incident the night Ash flew in. There have been times I despaired of whether I had made right choices involving the new apartment (wouldn’t the neighbors like us and the sink drain if God wanted us to be here?) simply because it wasn’t easy in the same ways as living in Alexandria was easy.

But those aren’t the moments I’ve been happy. No, the joy of the last few weeks has come in the moments that have happened only by God’s grace… and in the occasional periods when I have lived in the freedom that comes with recognizing I’m not in control.

Like the uninhibited exuberance of long-lost friends being reunited, engaging in muffled laughter deep into the night when we should’ve been sleeping. Being surprised by a party thrown by amazing people – one of whom really should have been doing things like, oh, I don’t know, getting ready for the wedding the next day. Tears of joy during prayers of thanksgiving. At last marriage vows. Sunday blueberry waffle brunch with the girls, drinking coffee, reminiscing over newly-made memories. And old ones, too.

The last month has been full of such touchstone moments, many of which already mean so much. Others will be imbued with even more meaning as time passes and life goes on. But recalling these recent golden sessions has helped me find my center of gravity again and become more conscious of the sometimes strange, sometimes lovely, always surprising elements of this new normal in which I’ve found myself.

So during business hours, I’ve spent a good deal of time curled up at my desk, getting what little needs to be done accomplished, listening to my Vienna Teng station on Pandora. The haunting melodies and thoughtful instrumentals of angsty female vocalists seem appropriate for an early autumn that still seems to be languishing in the warmth of summer. And after hours, I have lazily lounged on my wonderful red couch, watching evening passers-by under an orange twilight. I find myself at once relieved and despondent over the fact that I feel about as grown-up now as I did in my late teens.

But the despondency only lasts so long. I’m always telling people to “just be,” and I figure I’ll try taking my own advice for a while. Just to see what happens. The way I see it, surprises will always find us, and we can either live in terror or wonder. And I choose wonder.