26
december, 1999
Three years ago, I made a list.
I can still remember where I was when I wrote it, in the corner of little coffee shop on the way to Santa Cruz, by the window and the door, drinking tea out of an actual teacup and teapot. I stopped there (hid there, really) to write this particular list instead of continuing the drive through the winding Redwood trees to the Pacific Ocean. (My inner enneagram 7 still regrets that to this day. Alas.)
In that list, I wrote about my twenty-third birthday a few days previous, and twenty-three things I learned over the course of that year. I wrote with a hopeful expectation of the year to come and an open-handedness that makes me all emotional upon revisiting. How accompanied I was! How I am still learning so many of those things!
My favorite item on the list is item 13:
(I learned) that some decisions are really hard, and it's quite alright to cry your way through them.
As I sit in another December, and another birthday week, I feel such generous permission from my past self. She would not be ashamed, but instead open her arms wide as I, messy and honest, cried my way through taking on new responsibility at work, sending my words off into the bizarre world of the internet, through drying dishes on Thanksgiving and buying jeans at Old Navy and growing into this adult version of myself. Oh, how I long to be brave enough to burst from the soil, tears and all!
my beautiful plant (item 20)
This last Thanksgiving, as dinner came to a close and the aforementioned dishes were cleared from the tables, my mom (the number one fan of dinner-conversation-starters) posed a question, a little spin on the traditional question asked on Thanksgiving. She said. “What are you learning to be thankful for this year?”
What are you learning to be thankful for?
In the following weeks, I’ve found this question to be extremely sticky in the best way, by which I mean that I can’t stop thinking about it. I love it because it’s forced me to look with intention for the good ordinary things in a yet another year that was really difficult (I would argue the most difficult) and to consider what the pain might be growing in me.
When I first started this blog three and a half years ago (!!!!), I used to make lists all the time. Lists of miracles, and things I was thankful for, and things I was learning. There was a list in almost every post. Over time, maybe I outgrew it, or grew tired of it. But this week, as I turn twenty-six (a terrifyingly adult number which signifies a departure from my parents’ insurance coverage), I want to make another list, inspired by my mom’s question and a year of deep aching and reflection, and as an homage to my past self, who once struggled and asked questions and wept and wrote a list similar to this one.
TWENTY SIX THINGS I’M LEARNING TO BE THANKFUL FOR (in no particular order):
Oat milk. I gave up dairy two months ago and oat milk is saving my lattes, my morning cup(s) of tea, and therefore, my sanity.
This MacBook Air I’m writing on (and a dear friend who willingly helps me with all the tech in my life in this tech-heavy year of trying to do this writing thing). I’ve never had such a nice possession in all my days.
Poetry as prayer. Other people’s (Mary Oliver, Luci Shaw, Rainer Maria Rilke, Marie Howe, the Psalms), and my own.
The way you can see bird’s nests in the trees when the leaves fall. The bare branches that reveal the generous heart of things.
Living at home with a family (both immediate and extended) that loves me and wants me there. A whole journey, to come back. A whole journey, to stay.
Zoom. The oat milk of COVID. Not as good as the real thing, but a very good alternative.
Live-streamed concerts.
Hot baths with lavender bubbles. A Tuesday night ritual.
The way God whispers clues through unexpected conversations and song lyrics that stop me in the middle of my run and ask me to stand still in the middle of the park, listening.
Really good podcasts. (The Rise and Fall of Mars Hill, anyone?)
The generous rain that washes clean our dirty air and allows us to see the mountains again. Over and over. It’s own ritual.
The kindest parents who support me when I change my life plans one thousand times over.
My rice pack my grandmother sewed me that I warm up every night and place on my abdomen or my aching low back from lugging the giant flower boxes every day at work. The most comforting part of the day.
Twenty-second hugs. (Proven to help you calm down because your heart beats align!)
The interruptions, which, of late, have turned out to be moments of really sweet connection with the people right in front of me.
The most dear friendships, new and old, close by and far away, that rebelliously exist and persist through the tumultuous years and literal hundreds of miles. (But honestly, why is the United States so large?!)
The COVID-19 Tool Kit: thermometers, masks with cute patterns, vaccines, best friends at work, lavender scented hand-sanitizer, etc. All things that keep me safe, sane, and allow my inner hypochondriac to calm the heck down after the gazillionth panic attack of being sure I have COVID.
Dry Shampoo. I’m sorry for all the times I shamed people for using it. It’s a winner and I’m hooked.
The way the sunrise trickles through the front windows of the house and dances on the steam from the neighbors chimney, and the way my dog rests beneath it every morning.
My plant that is growing so beautifully despite my real and serious ineptitude to take care of it.
Unexpected big feelings. Weeping and laughter, both. And sometimes both at once, which is the best kind of all.
Online communities of writers and artists and friends in this weird age where face-to-face connection is hard to come by.
Forgiveness. Giving it, and asking for it.
The church calendar, from lent to ordinary time to advent, as a guide to communion when the realities of God feel so distant and surprising and out of our specific place.
The love of God lavished on me, in heartbeats and inhales and exhales, full and overflowing, in God’s entirely unmerited presence with me, helping me to hold still in a long season of waiting.
The power of a really good jacket.
favorite running spot, thanksgiving morning
Thank you for being here with me this year, and for the past three and a half. It tremendous privilege to walk with you, and to know you’re walking with me. Here’s to a new year, to brave hearts and open hands and paying attention to the light.
All my love,
Alyssa
p.s. The most fun part of all of this is that the essay I wrote about above came out exactly three years ago to the day! Read it here if you want to journey back in time with me.
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