A Room of One’s Own
Inspired by a pair of original 1950s architectural renderings for my childhood home, I set out to create a room that was more mature, more organized, and more inviting.
Virginia Woolf famously argued that creative genius needs space to inhabit, private space where the artist can live and work and observe free from constant interruptions and the meddling expectations of society. I agree with Woolf’s premise, though I am certainly no genius and could only be called an artist in the amateur sense. But as someone who has shared a room with others for the majority of my life, I can say that having a room of one’s own is truly wonderful. And there is also something very special about creating a room of one’s own—taking an empty shell and transforming it into a space with character and meaning.
For a long time, my room was just cluttered square-footage that held a bed, a dresser, a growing pile of boxes, and too many pairs of shoes. This would have been deeply disappointing to young Derek, who dreamed of the day he would finally have his own space to curate. But I didn’t have enough storage for my things, and I knew that even if I managed to organize better, the room would still be an uninspiring gray box—empty walls, cold floor, terrible lighting. And so, it languished for many moons in bachelor purgatory.
The impetus for change was a gift from total strangers. There are few places as precious to me as the home I grew up in, and when my parents moved to South Africa and the house was sold, it felt like a death. Longing for some sort of tangible connection to that place and all the wonderful memories it holds, I thought of the creased, yellowed blueprints I had seen as a child. Sadly, they had been transferred with the house, and there seemed to be little hope of getting them back. But at the encouragement of my friend Natalie, I wrote a letter to the new owners, asking if they’d part with the renderings. They responded with a very kind letter of their own and generously mailed me the blueprints. I had them framed and eagerly set about creating a room worthy of displaying them. The result is a space I am proud of and a place I’m always eager to retreat to at the end of the day. I’m so happy to share the final product with you and to offer a few tips and tricks I learned along the way!
Identify Problems, Settle on Solutions
Makeovers can easily get out of hand as one change inspires another. To keep them from becoming costly and overwhelming, it helps to give yourself some guidelines. Identifying specific problems and settling on specific solutions helped me focus this makeover and keep it from stretching on indefinitely (which my creative endeavors tend to do).
Problem: The surface of my dresser was constantly cluttered, and I was always losing important pieces of mail in the stacks of paper, socks, and ephemera.
Solution: My important documents are now organized in a small filing cabinet that doubles as my nightstand; all other mail now goes in the kitchen. A vintage jewelry box from Etsy holds outfit accessories, and vintage bookends from eBay corral my books and round out the vignette.
Problem: The reading lamp took up too much space on the top of my nightstand. My books and my phone were always falling off the table.
Solution: A wall-mounted reading light allowed me to remove my old lamp and create more space on the nightstand.
Problem: My clothes were always collecting on top of these boxes and shams. It looked messy, and it made it hard to find clothing items later.
Solution: Wall hooks and a hamper mean that worn clothes now have a place to go even if I don’t feel like putting them away or taking them to the laundry room.
Problem: The hardwood floors looked nice, but they weren’t very comfortable underfoot, and there was nothing to visually anchor the scattered elements of the room.
Solution: The new rug makes the room so much more inviting and visually unifies the space.
Make It Easy on Yourself
Living in a rented house, I’m always brainstorming home improvements that won’t break the terms of my lease or create lots of work for me later. For this makeover, I also concentrated on creating a space that is easy to maintain. These tips will make your life much easier whether you’re a renter or a harried homeowner.
The Lighting on the Wall
If you’re looking to supplement the overhead lighting in your space, or if you don’t have room for lamps, consider a wall-mounted reading light. They save space, require no wiring, and leave behind only a couple screw holes. They also come in many styles. This one swivels to make reading in bed easy.
One-Hit Wonder
Instead of a series of hooks, consider a hook rack. It’s easier to ensure a rack is level, and it will leave far fewer nail holes to patch later. This streamlined rack I ordered online holds hats, coats, bags, and pretty much anything else I need it to.
Get Over Your (Lack of) Shelves
If you don’t have room to hang a shelf or don’t want to deal with drywall anchors and heavy-duty screws, find a neat way to display items on a surface you already have. I created my own “bookshelf” on my dresser with free-standing books and a pair of onyx bookends.
Know When To Stop
Don’t add things you don’t need. The top of my dresser is admittedly a bit spare, and it wouldn’t suffer from a couple other decorative items. But this isn’t one of the primary living spaces in the house, and I don’t need more objects to dust.
Tassels Equal Hassles
Choose a rug without tassels to make vacuuming and mopping easier. This will also give your room a more streamlined appearance overall.
Corner Concerns
In an ideal world, no bed is ever put in a corner. Corner beds are a pain to make, and they immediately set a room off balance. But I needed to maximize the functionality of this small space. When I first moved in, I insisted on the bed coming off the largest wall and acting as the focal point of the room. But after months of feeling cramped, I acquiesced and pushed it into the corner. The room instantly felt more spacious and breathable. Light bedding keeps this corner from feeling too heavy, and a rug that fills the room acts as a counterbalance to this large piece of furniture.
Choose Variety, Find Balance
One thing I’ve learned from following professional designers and taking notes on my favorite spaces is that the most interesting rooms have variety. Mixing scales, shapes, patterns, textures, and finishes gives a space its character and creates a sense of balance that is still multi-dimensional. Here’s how this strategy applies in my room.
It Takes All Kinds
Many different materials create a well-rounded vignette—wooden credenza, brass lamp, leather jewelry box, stone bookends. These harder elements also play off the softer elements in the room to create a space that’s masculine but not austere.
Make Connections
Repeated elements keep the variety from feeling chaotic. The bedding, rug, nightstand, and hamper all belong to the same color family. The black reading light references the black hook rack and the black elements of my clothing rack. The wooden picture frames reference the credenza. The brass clasp on the jewelry box references the lamp. The bookends may seem like an outlier, but the colors in the stone reference the yellowed blueprints and the orange throw on the bed.
Contrast Is Key
The dark, large-scale pattern of the rug contrasts with the light, small scale-pattern of the comforter and anchors an otherwise light-colored room.
Break Up the Boxes
The rounded dome of the lamp, the curve of the bookends, the circular profile of the reading light, and the oval shape of the hamper keep the room from feeling too linear or boxy.
Prioritize Investments
None of us have unlimited resources, and none of us want to spend frivolously. Deciding ahead of time where you will invest and where you will save will keep you from frustration or bankruptcy later. Here are some investments that always add great value to a space.
Check Your Foundation
Invest in a rug that is the appropriate size for your room. A properly scaled rug helps to visually unify a room and group furniture. On the other hand, a rug that is too small makes a room feel cluttered and disjointed. Think of the rug as the foundation rather than an accessory.
A Personal Matter
Invest in artwork and wall decor that has sentimental value. Pieces that have a personal connection or evoke an emotional response from you will always be more interesting than stock art you can find online or at home décor chains. These architectural renderings of my childhood home flood me with nostalgia every time I look at them. Plus, I got to support a friend of mine who works part time as a custom framer.
Rooms Are Related
Invest in spaces connected to other spaces. Create a vignette in one room that provides a vista for an adjoining room. This doubles the value of your investment as it can be enjoyed in both spaces. When the door is open, my room is visible from the moment you walk in the house. I wanted it to look warm and inviting from all the way down the hall.
The Takeaways
This makeover was a learning experience for me, not only in terms of execution but also in regard to spatial theory. I realize most people don’t think about their spaces on a theoretical level, but whether we’re aware of it or not, we all relate to our surroundings in a way that goes beyond our aesthetic preferences. I’ve been working for quite some time to develop a personal approach to space that reflects values like hospitality, functionality, comfort, and contentment. These are some of the lessons this project taught me.
Organization: Contained Chaos
Here, I must give credit to one of my favorite YouTubers, Caroline Winkler. Her video on home organization was revolutionary for me and became the catalyst for some of the specific changes I made in this makeover. One groundbreaking principle I learned from Caroline is this: organization is about managing your habits more than it is about managing your stuff (though a good declutter is always a good idea). For example, most nights I refuse to rehang my dress clothes or fold lightly worn t-shirts and put them back in their drawer. For whatever reason, I find this task unbearable. So, all these clothes used to wind up in a (neat) pile at the foot of my bed. But this was unsightly and dysfunctional. The question became, How can I keep my room tidy without putting away every article of clothing every night? Enter wall hooks and a hamper. The hooks keep clothes off the floor, and the hamper saves me daily trips to the laundry room. I found a way to work around my habits to maintain an organized space.
Unfinished Is Not Unenjoyable
I struggle to be satisfied with things I deem incomplete. I hate long, incremental projects, and I’d rather avoid a project entirely if the results won’t live up to my vision. But homes are dynamic spaces that defy completion, and I am learning that rooms can be enjoyable even if they are not “finished.” I brought this makeover to a point of closure, but there are many things I’d still change if I weren’t renting and if I had unlimited resources. I’d love to add window coverings and a headboard. I’d love to replace my $15 Target clothing rack with a deco armoire. I’d love to have an actual bedside table instead of a miniature filing cabinet. And I’d love to paint. But I like my room even without these things. It is warm and inviting, well-organized, and sentimental in the right ways. Will it ever grace the pages of a magazine or a coffee table book? Probably not. But it makes me happy just the same.
Better Rooms for Better People?
As I mentioned before, the spaces we occupy have a greater impact on us than we often realize. They can help us develop and maintain healthy habits, or they can leave us trapped in cycles of inefficiency, disorder, and procrastination. They can help us focus and rest, or they can cause distraction and stress. They can lift our spirits and boost our motivation, or they can bring us down and impede productivity. It’s all in what we make of them. This makeover taught me that we can leverage the spaces we have to help ourselves grow. I’m working to be a more organized person, and the small organizational changes I made in my room are pushing me toward that goal. I’m also working to fight my materialistic impulses. Purging unnecessary stuff from my room and limiting the scope of my makeover helped me to reject the idea that more is always better. I’m not trying to remove the element of human responsibility or overstate the power of a physical space, but I do believe that our homes, offices, and gathering places have more potential than we imagine. Try it! Create a grown-up room for a child trying to practice more maturity and responsibility. Carve out an inspiring space for a friend trying to lean into their creativity. Declutter your office to eliminate distractions and help yourself focus. I think you’ll be surprised by the results!
A New Way to Think about Space
All this discussion prompts me to ask the question, What makes a good space? I used to think it was about nailing a certain aesthetic or achieving a “finished product.” But that’s just not the case. Put simply, a good space is one that begs people to return. A good space is personal—an original expression of the people who live there rather than an embodiment of trends. A good space invites the curiosity of guests by telling a story and having a unique point of view. A good space evolves and can be experienced in new ways over time. A good space makes people feel welcome and comfortable. Social media and home improvement shows tend to reinforce the idea that design is a superficial art because that message encourages people to spend money. But remember, it’s about crafting an experience, not curating a look. You’re inviting people into your home, not a showroom. Our spaces are ultimately about the intention behind them rather than the things in them.
The One Where They Go to Maine
To Pearl, who shared her home and her love for Maine with so many
I have been privileged to travel a good deal in my twenty-seven years, but no matter where I roam, Hancock County, Maine, will always be one of my favorite places. It is home to Acadia National Park and historic Bar Harbor, once a summer destination for the barons and their families and now a popular tourist locale. It is also home to the small town of Winter Harbor, where my great-aunt Pearl's tiny cottage sits perched above the waters of Summer Cove.
This pocket of coastline is a surreal place—a cloistered world I want to share with everyone but keep to myself at the same time. When I'm there, I am awakened into an energetic contentment that I think must be rest.
I have been rhapsodizing about this place to my college friends since 2014, and on many occasions over the years, I suggested the possibility of a group vacation to Maine, never believing it would really happen. But two summers ago, against the odds, it did; and it was a trip I will cherish always.
It is a rare gift to be able to share a piece of your childhood with your adult friends, and I was so humbled that my friends trusted me enough to follow me all the way to this little corner of the country.
Getting There
For most of us, who live in Greenville, South Carolina, it was a considerable journey to Winter Harbor, Maine. And it was even further afield for Holly, who would be flying from Memphis (where she was helping with a church summer camp), and for Jon, who would be flying from his home in LA. Lenny and Jess decided to fly from Greenville, but Joseph, Jessica, Meg, and I decided to drive. The two-day road trip would be cheaper than flying and would provide us with a second vehicle to help us travel around Acadia. My sister and brother-in-law kindly offered for us to spend the night at their home in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, the perfect halfway milestone.
Joseph's Prius was elected as the vessel for our voyage, being the most reliable and fuel-efficient of our vehicles. Our first day of driving was uneventful. Joseph drove most of the distance, and we made it to Lancaster by dinnertime. My sister and brother-in-law were out, so we decided to drop our luggage at their house and go to Chipotle for a bite to eat.
As we entered the parking lot, Meg realized she had left her wallet at the house. "Hey, Jessica, guess what?" she said, as if she had a surprise. (This kind of diplomacy makes Meg our go-to spokesperson when something awkward must be said.) Jessica knew the truth before Meg could even spit it out. She complained about spotting Meg, pretending it was a serious financial burden even though she really couldn't have cared less. We decided that leaving behind a form of payment would henceforth be called "pulling a Meg," and it became an accusation we used throughout the trip.
I will admit that stopping in Pennsylvania served a personal agenda (aside from seeing family). I had insisted from the start that we stop at a Wawa while passing through PA. I was going to prove to my southern friends once-and-for-all that Wawa is a better gas station/convenience store/eatery than QT. The plan was perfect—we'd hit the road early the second morning, find a Wawa to fill up, enjoy some delicious breakfast sandwiches, and stock up on snacks for the road.
Unfortunately, things did not go to plan. Because Joseph's Prius was so darn fuel-efficient, we didn't need to fill up right away, and because I am not a morning person, I had soon drifted into a comfortable slumber. And somewhere past the bucolic fields of Lancaster County, unbeknownst to me, we plunged into New Jersey.
Eventually I stirred awake, and Joseph said we would soon be needing gas. We selected a Wawa along our route and drove on toward that blessed establishment. My anticipation was boiling. This would be the first of many sacred things I'd share with my friends on this trip.
As we pulled up to the Wawa, I was dismayed to realize our GPS had recommended one of the handful of Wawas that is only a convenience store and not a gas station. "You mean we can't even get gas here?" they complained. As I recall, the bathrooms were not great either; one of them may even have been closed. But let's be clear: Wawa has never promised glamorous bathroom accommodations. That is not why people go to Wawa. People go to Wawa for the fresh hoagies, the warm soft pretzels, the sting of hot coffee, and the general northern disregard that is momentarily softened by shared affection for this faithful franchise.
After ordering enough food for breakfast and lunch, we drove across the street to a rather worn-down Sunoco, where a man in a turban approached our car.
"What's this man doing?" Joseph said in confusion.
"Oh, are we in New Jersey?” I asked, suddenly realizing how long I'd slept. "He's going to pump your gas."
"But I don't want him to pump my gas," Joseph replied indignantly.
"You don't have a choice," I laughed. "You're not allowed to pump your own gas in Jersey."
Joseph reluctantly handed the man his credit card. He watched, stupefied and somewhat emasculated, as the man went about his job. The rest of us cackled mercilessly. We would tease him about this incident the rest of the trip.
Altogether, it was not the most successful Wawa stop, but I think everyone liked their sandwiches well enough. I'm not sure if it beat QT in their estimation, but I don't think the contest really mattered to them that much. They don't have quite the same attachment to QT we northerners have to Wawa.
In total, Joseph, Jessica, Meg, and I spent twenty-some hours in the car together, passing snacks back-and-forth, playing twenty questions, and listening to comedy specials. We were the first to arrive at the cottage, just before golden hour. As we rounded the bend in the gravel driveway, the glint of the sunlight on the water pierced through the curtain of pines, beckoning us onward. It was just as I remembered it, just as I had hoped it would be.
Summer Cove from the deck of Pearl’s cottage
Meet the Friends
Lenny, Jess, and Jon arrived later that evening under the most spectacular blanket of stars I have ever seen. I was beside myself with happiness, watching the tiny, hallowed living room fill up with these dear friends. Holly would fly in the following morning, and the first group decision we had to make was who would go pick her up at the airport an hour away. The four of us road-weary travelers had already decided it should be Lenny, Jess, and Jon, and we left it to Meg to break the news.
“So, we were thinking that the people who go get Holly should be people that did not drive twenty-plus hours to get here,” Meg said with her aforementioned diplomacy.
“Oh, okay,” Jess retorted as the room broke into laughter.
“I mean that in the best way possible,” Meg insisted.
“So, where is everyone sleeping?” someone asked. Thankfully, we had solved this puzzle beforehand.
I must reemphasize how compact the cottage is. It was designed for a small family—certainly not eight college friends. But in the proud tradition of college friends with tight budgets, we had determined to make it work. Jessica, Holly, and Meg, the three roommates, would share the king bed in the master. Lenny and Jess, the married couple among us, would take the room with the two twin beds. Joseph and Jon would share the sleeper sofa. And I would sleep at the foot of the dining table on an air mattress we’d brought along.
It was quite a cozy situation, but the eight of us had been friends for seven years at this point, many of us living together along the way. We had endured tight accommodations before in old campus housing, sweaty church vans, and rain-battered tents and had proved that we were, at the very least, compatible.
We noted almost right away that our group personality had taken on a sort of accidental symmetry—four free spirits and four pragmatists. This may seem like a tired and overly simplistic characterization, but we had all more-than-earned our place within our respective categories, and there was to be no doubt over the course of the trip who belonged to which group.
Free Spirits
Meg (The Diplomat) Always keeping the peace Jess (The Flower Child) Always happy with the sun and the water Jon (The Localist) Always hunting for an authentic experience Me (The Enthusiast) Always too excited about everything
Pragmatists
Jessica (The Planner) Queen of the Google doc Lenny (The Breadwinner) An exemplary remote employee Joseph (The Strategist) Champion of the “best way” Holly (The Mussel Whisperer) Loves a scavenger hunt
In hindsight, this equilibrium served us well for most of the trip. But anyone privy to our nightly planning sessions would be shocked that we accomplished anything. As the only one who had ever been to Maine, I tried to steer the group toward what I considered the essential experiences, but I didn’t want to commandeer the schedule—I wanted a democratic decision-making process that gave everyone a voice. This was all well and good, but sometimes democracy is chaos, and even with a few “musts” established before we arrived, there was still much time to fill and many opinions on how to fill it.
In the evenings, when everyone was full and tired and the sun had finally receded past the horizon, the question would slowly rise to the surface: “So what are we doing tomorrow, guys?” It was usually Meg or Jessica who finally asked because no one else was willing to initiate what was certain to be a long, circuitous conversation.
It’s not that we were argumentative or that anyone was a bully; we just had so many ideas. And on several nights, just as we were about to settle on a feasible plan, someone would make another suggestion that would cause us to start all over at the beginning. Jon was perhaps the worst offender in this regard because all the poor man wanted was a lobster boat tour, which never quite seemed to fit into the rest of our plans. Jon has a knack for finding the soul of a place. (On this trip, he managed to strike up a half-hour conversation with a curator in Southwest Harbor and order a chair hand-crafted in Nicaragua. He also found a discarded lobster trap that he shipped back to LA to enhance his 100-gallon fish tank.) And he was convinced that a tour with a local lobsterman was the most quintessentially Maine experience one could have. I too would have enjoyed this activity, but not everyone was game for a half-day adventure on the high seas hoisting lobster traps and tasting salt.
In addition to everyone’s wish-list items, we had to account for Lenny’s work schedule. He had to work Monday through Thursday, and we wanted to avoid doing anything too important without him. But we also didn’t want to spend all day every day lying around the cottage. So the question every night became, What can we do tomorrow that Lenny is okay with missing? Ironically, this sort of allowed Lenny to check out of most of our planning discussions, which he was thankful for.
One night toward the end of the week when planning fatigue had nearly crushed our collective spirit, we held a particularly tedious session. The schedule had been redrafted multiple times, and just as we were finalizing a plan that worked for everyone, Jon asked, as if making the proposition for the first time, “Is there any way we can fit in a local boat tour?”
Across the room, Holly stood up from her chair, teacher hand extended to the room, and announced, “I’m done. I’m going to bed. Y’all tell me what we’re doing in the morning.”
Unfortunately, Jon never did get his lobster boat tour, which I still feel bad about. But I do think we made the most of our time there. We found a great balance between busyness and rest, between trying new things and simply enjoying each other’s company. And everyone’s unique contributions made the trip more interesting and more enjoyable than it would have been otherwise. More than anything we saw or did, I was most gratified that at the end of the trip I felt more love and appreciation for each of my friends than I had at the start—never a guarantee when eight comrades choose to share a home for a week in a remote location (see Rian Johnson’s Glass Onion).
Top row (left to right): Lenny, Joseph, Jon, Me; Bottom row (left to right): Jess, Meg, Holly, Jessica
The Most Beautiful Gazebo in the World
I am not typically a very loud or exclamatory person, but something comes over me at certain times and in certain places when I am able to relinquish my usual cares and concerns and simply be an audience to the world. I begin to find everything so wondrous—water, trees, light, shadow, sounds, stillness—the most elemental pieces of our world that surround me every day but in veiled glory. Maine is one of those places where I begin to see again, and with renewed sight comes unrestrained enthusiasm.
We had barely crossed the border when it began.
“Ooh! Look at those lupines!” I said, tapping urgently on my window as though I could draw the eyes of everyone else in the car to the very spot I was pointing. “Lupines are some of my favorite flowers, and they grow wild up here,” I explained.
That would have served as a sufficient PSA about Maine’s beautiful wildflowers. But every five to ten minutes I was pointing out another roadside cluster of lupines. Soon, Meg and Jessica began mocking me: “Derek! Look at those lupines!”
By the time we arrived in Winter Harbor, my excitement was hot like a fever. But it was not just my own joy this time. My happiness was compounded by the delight my friends were sure to experience as they saw Maine for the first time. And it was enflamed even more by this folding of time, this opportunity to introduce my adult friends to a sacred piece of my youth.
Of course, along with my revelry came a sense of responsibility for my friends’ enjoyment. And behind this sense of responsibility was hiding a subtle fear that if the trip didn’t live up to their expectations, I would never quite be taken seriously again. I tried to push this faulty notion out of my mind, telling myself that I could not make anyone have a good time. The best thing I could do was enjoy myself and hope that everyone else would catch on.
Our first evening in the cottage was perfect, but the following morning my sunny projection for the week was overshadowed by a most unfortunate turn of events. Just as I was about to sit down to breakfast, I was informed that the toilets in both bathrooms were overflowing. I brought my friends all the way here only to make them use the woods for a week, I catastrophized. I frantically assessed the situation and then immediately called my Pop-pop, who offered his deepest condolences and gave me a few instructions to flush out the system.
A few of my friends offered to help, but I could not allow this to be part of their experience. An hour and a half later, after lots of plunging and mopping and a regiment of Drano, I was finally able to return to my breakfast. And mercifully, the septic system gave us no further trouble.
Admittedly, in the wake of this near-disaster, my enthusiasm faltered a bit, but I quickly recovered. My response to the highway flora turned out to be my reflex for anything I found exciting—which was most things. Multiple times an hour, I'd involuntarily exclaim, "Ooh! Look at that!" While hiking: "Ooh! Look at that cool tree!" While ordering lunch: "Ooh! Look at that lobster roll!" While making dinner: "Ooh! These mussels are gonna be amazing!" And by day two, my friends were heckling me nonstop. Every "Ooh!" from me was followed by a chorus of "oohs" from them. The game lasted all week, and though I grew a bit insecure about my exclamation of choice, I never grew embarrassed of my wonder because I could sense that my friends felt it too.
The real teasing, however, came at the end of the week when we visited Bar Harbor. I had long since transgressed the one rule of sharing—don’t overhype the experience. Everyone knows that when you share a song or a movie or a restaurant or a city with someone, you don’t create unrealistic expectations. This inevitably leads to disappointment for you both and puts your friend in the precarious position of having to feign amazement or crush your spirit. But despite this time-proven principle, I had been carrying on for months about all the incredible things we would see and experience on our trip. And at some point during this interval, while indulging in a moment of hyperbole, I made a passing remark about Bar Harbor having “the most beautiful gazebo you’ve ever seen.” Somehow my friends latched onto this comment, and they were soon convinced I had promised them “the most beautiful gazebo in the world.”
To be fair, it is the most beautiful gazebo I have ever seen. Its elegant white frame sits isolated on the velvet lawn in Agamont Park, overlooking the fishing boats bobbing up and down in the harbor and the couples strolling along the gravel Shore Path. It takes in such lovely sights and sounds and on a late fall afternoon or evening would afford just the right amount of privacy for a proposal. Obviously, it has always held a great deal of romance for me.
To my friends, however, it was hopelessly funny. “Look at that gazebo!” they cried with exaggerated amazement. Whether or not it lived up to its billing, it had become legendary among the eight of us, so we crowded in the archway for a picture. “I don’t know about ‘the best gazebo in the world,’” someone said, but to this day, none of them have claimed to see a finer one.
Out to Sea
The day after we arrived was Sunday, and there were errands to run. Jessica, Meg, and Joseph had been assigned to grocery duty, and Lenny and Jess offered to go pick Holly up at the airport. (Meg had proven tactful and persuasive once again.) I was exempted from errands after dealing with the plumbing emergency, and Jon was left behind to keep me company. This left the two of us with time on our hands, and that was the top of a slippery slope.
It was a glorious day, so Jon suggested packing a lunch and taking the canoe out. "If we're not back by 4:00, start to worry," Jon told the others. Maybe he truly anticipated being gone the entire afternoon, but I expected we'd row across to Jordan Island (within sight of the cottage), eat our lunch, explore a bit, and row back well before the others returned. Neither of us could have anticipated what the afternoon would truly hold.
As we paddled toward Jordan Island, Jon spotted Egg Rock Light off in the distance. "Bro, we should row out to that lighthouse," he said.
"That's way farther than it looks," I laughed dismissively. But we agreed to row to the next island, eat lunch, and reassess.
By the time we reached Ironbound Island for lunch, we were a bit weary, and Jon admitted that maybe the lighthouse was too far. But after eating, we were filled with renewed energy and hubris. "We're already almost halfway there. Let's go for it," I said.
We were almost halfway, but there were so many other factors we hadn't considered. Before lunch, we'd had the islands as a fixed reference, so it felt like we were making quick progress. But once we got past the islands into the open water, distance and time melted away, and the lighthouse seemed to remain forever out of reach. Whitecaps crested all around us, and because we hadn't thought to check, we found ourselves rowing against the incoming tide. Not to mention that neither of us are regular paddlers and neither of us had ever canoed on the ocean. On top of all this, we had no cell reception and no other communication devices. It was just us and the waves.
At so many points, we should have turned around, simply given in and let the tide carry us back. But the sunk-cost fallacy and our own stubbornness bore us onward. Ahead of us, we could see tour boats from Bar Harbor circling Egg Rock with their passengers, watching all the birds circling overhead. We did our best to appear like confident rowers and not a vessel in distress.
Finally, after a couple grueling hours, we ran aground on the rocky shore. The feeling of exhilaration was quickly dampened by a sign announcing that the island was closed for waterfowl nesting season. But we had come too far—we had to see the lighthouse. And the tour boats had since gone, so there was no one around to spot us.
I suppose I thought the nesting birds would overlook our intrusion if we left them alone, but they clearly had a zero-tolerance policy. As we began walking up the path toward the lighthouse, I realized just how many birds there were—hundreds, if not thousands—and just how many nests they were guarding. Even sticking to the trail, we couldn't help but disturb them. Their distressed shrieking was deafening. I kept expecting to feel a warm splat on my head or to be dive-bombed at any moment. We advanced cautiously, arms shielding our heads, like paratroopers hopelessly trying to avoid enemy fire. We were about halfway to the lighthouse when we saw a tour boat approaching the island.
"They're gonna call someone on us," I told Jon.
"Yeah bro, we should go back," he agreed.
We ducked down so as not to be seen and raced back to the canoe. We threw it in the water and jumped in after it, wanting to put as much distance as possible between us and the island. We paddled aggressively, using the tide to our advantage this time, and soon we were too far from the island to be considered trespassers. Quite tired, we paused to rest our arms and pull a snack from the drybag.
We were growing concerned about our time. Our phones told us we’d been gone for a few hours already, and we were unsure we could make it back by 4:00. Still out of cell service, there was no way to warn our friends. All we could do was row faster. The return voyage would theoretically be easier, but the ocean is at best an indifferent collaborator. The waves were pushing us in the general direction we needed to go, but they were much choppier than before, and they carried us off our axis before we could notice or protest. We came the closest to capsizing on our way back and realized that the sea always demands vigilance, even when it appears friendly.
After an indefinite period, we finally rounded the shoreline and came within sight of the cottage. Thoroughly exhausted, mildly shaken, and very proud, we pulled the canoe ashore at 3:56 pm. Our friends were lounging in the sunshine, apparently unconcerned. As we told them our tale, they shook their heads, trying to withhold their amusement.
Later that evening, Jon did some calculations. It turns out we had rowed almost ten miles on a whim. “You’re the only person in my life I would have done this with,” I told him. “Because I never would have initiated it, and I would’ve said ‘no’ to anyone else who suggested it.”
Our voyage as the crow flies, so really not a very accurate representation.
Locals and Locales
That evening after dinner, we decided to visit nearby Schoodic Point to watch the sunset. Even though Schoodic Peninsula is part of Acadia National Park and therefore belongs to the US government, I have come to think of it as an extension of Pearl’s property. And catching a sunset on the Point is almost as fundamental as viewing the sunset from the deck of the cottage. It’s always quiet except for the waves, the gulls, and the wind-dampened voices of other revelers. And it’s a wonderful place to linger if you’re hoping to understand the simple, steadfast beauty of coastal Maine.
As soon as we arrived, I took off across the familiar rocks, camera swinging violently from my neck as I jumped from boulder to boulder. My friends followed along a bit more gingerly, choosing every step for the first time. It was a cool evening, probably in the 50s, and they were all layered in sweatshirts and flannels, while I sported shorts and a cut-off. Maybe my northern blood runs cold, but I have always felt most alive in those crisp temperatures. My friends looked at me like I was a lunatic. “It’s invigorating!” I insisted, remembering the words of my Pop-pop on many a cold morning. They just smiled and shook their heads.
On our way around the peninsula, we also stopped at Raven’s Nest, an unmarked roadside marvel that’s worth pulling over for if you can find it. A short footpath winds through the trees to a small ravine cut into the coastline. The floor of the “nest” is covered with large, rounded stones that tumble over each other as the waves wash in and out of the cavity. It sounds like an audience repeatedly clapping at the wrong moment before being silenced by the conductor. No rails or ropes guard the edge, so you are able to get as close as you dare, gaze down into the hole, and listen as this wonderful ritual plays out over and over again.
The warm light of golden hour highlighted all the colors of the cliffside, and the creeping dogwood at the edge of the tree line was in full bloom. Jon stood silently near the water’s edge, sipping coffee from one of the cottage mugs. Joseph was lying on his stomach, head hung over the ledge, watching intently as the waves rearranged the rocks below. The girls were huddled together taking group photos. Lenny roved about, admiring the landscape and scanning the scene with the ever-watchful eyes of a group dad. I found myself, camera to my face, trying to capture each of my friends as they experienced the magic of the place in their own ways.
I had come to Maine with great expectations for all that we would do. I wanted to show my friends as much of the area as I had seen and maybe even more. Thankfully they were all very eager to explore. We did a good deal of hiking as that is one of the best ways to see Acadia National Park. The hike I most wanted to share with them was the Precipice Trail on Champlain Mountain, but sadly, the route was closed for peregrine falcon nesting season. And after our brazen assault on Egg Rock, Jon and I decided not to trespass again. After all, birds of prey are generally more adversarial than waterfowl, and park rangers, I gather, can be even worse. The boys were mildly disappointed to miss out on this hike, but I think the girls were quietly relieved to not be taking any chances on the most hazardous trail in the park.
Instead, our first hike was to Schoodic Head, the highest point on Schoodic Peninsula, from which you can see all of Frenchman Bay and the eastern shore of Mt. Desert Island. We chose to hike the Alder Trail to the Schoodic Head Trail and then descend the mountain on the Anvil Trail. I had hiked this route the year before with my Pop-pop, my sister, and my brother-in-law, and found it to be an incredibly interesting trail with several distinct environmental pockets. I knew my friends would enjoy the natural stone staircases that wind up between giant rock formations like something out of Middle Earth. And I was sure to point out the undergrowth of wild huckleberry at the peak that turns into a fiery red carpet in the fall.
The trail truly morphs around you. One moment you’re surrounded by tall deciduous trees, carefully choosing each step on the slippery rocks that interrupt the rivulets of water running down the mountain. Minutes later you’re walking among redolent pines, plodding along almost silently on a bed of needles. At the summit, dwarf trees grow out of the inhospitable bedrock, twisted in the shape of the wind with limp moss draped over their limbs like shredded shawls.
The hike can be challenging in places, especially near the summit, but it’s not too difficult overall, and there are plenty of great places to pause and rest. It was the perfect introductory hike that prepared us for the Beehive. Hiking the Beehive Loop was our concession for missing out on the Precipice Trail, and we waited until Friday when Lenny was able to join us.
The Beehive is a massive, 500-foot dome that rises above Park Loop Rd. in Acadia. The trail can be rather hazardous because it is so steep and because it involves climbing up several series of iron rungs imbedded in the side of the mountain. It requires a lot of concentration, but it offers incredible unobstructed views that allow you to see miles out into the Atlantic. And walking along a shallow shelf hundreds of feet above the ground is a special kind of thrill.
Some members of the group were quite apprehensive about endeavoring this climb. There was talk of some people waiting at the bottom while the rest of us hiked, but we were planning to have a picnic at the top, so splitting up was ruled out. Left with no better options, everyone was forced to give it a shot.
The hike has the potential to be very grueling because of the drastic incline, but there were a good number of people on the trail, and everyone was moving cautiously so as to avoid falling to their deaths. The trail is too narrow to pass other hikers, so we were forced to take our time. Between vertical ascents, we rested against the wall of the mountain, perched like little tchotchkes on the ledges, some of us perfectly content, others hardly believing where they found themselves. But by the time we made it to the top, everyone was feeling rather accomplished, and I think the experience proved to be one of everyone’s favorites from the trip.
The other vantage point I was determined to show my friends was Cadillac Mountain. The peak is the first place the sun touches in the continental United States, and it offers panoramic views of Mt. Desert Island, Bar Harbor, Frenchman Bay, and the Atlantic Ocean. Sunrise is an obvious time to visit, but Lenny had decided to take Thursday afternoon off, so we packed a picnic and drove to the summit for lunch.
There is a station just below the summit parking lot where park employees check for parking reservations and national parks passes—one for each vehicle. Jon had brought along his park pass, which covered one vehicle for the trip, but we needed a second one, and they can be expensive. My Grandpa kindly loaned me his senior pass, and I had hoped our shared last name would be enough to satisfy the rangers. But when we presented the pass to the gentleman in the booth, he looked at us with skepticism. “Which one of you is Donald Gahman?” he asked. Lenny’s intimidating expression and dark sunglasses hadn’t worked on this man.
I leaned forward from the backseat. “He’s my grandfather,” I responded.
“Well, you tell your grandfather he’s not allowed to share his pass,” the man said as he placed a red check mark on the back. “If he gets two more of these marks, the pass will be revoked.” Then he kindly waved us on without making us pay $30 for a single-day pass. What a legend.
It was windy on the summit, but the sun was warm enough, and it had burned away all the morning mist, allowing us to see for miles in every direction. The morning crowds had also dwindled, and we enjoyed a nice lunch on a large, open bald spot facing Bar Harbor, which we would visit later that afternoon.
Sitting that far above the town watching the boats drift in and out of the harbor is kind of like visiting a miniature village. The mountaintop is much too far away to see people walking the streets, but it’s easy to imagine their lives unfolding. Tourists wandering about among the shops and restaurants. Children and dogs playing in the park. Couples strolling the gravel path along the water’s edge. This experience reminds me of visiting Roadside America with my Pop-pop when I was a little boy. I always wanted to enter that miniature world and find out what life was like there among those little people. Descending the mountain and driving down into Bar Harbor is almost like doing just that—becoming part of something that was only just a fiction.
In some ways, this is what the whole trip was about. Letting my friends into a part of my world that had, up until that point, only ever been pictures and anecdotes. It’s a vulnerable thing to do—let people into something sacred. And my instinct in those situations is to act like a tour guide. To point out everything I want them to notice. To constantly assess their engagement and excitement. To have them retrace the footsteps of my experience. But this is not what I would have wanted had I been able to enter that magical world of miniatures. I would have wanted to experience it for myself in my own style, at my own pace, following my own inclinations. I hope I allowed my friends to experience Maine in this way. I hope I played the host instead of the guide and made them feel welcome rather than educated. And whether or not they found something sacred in it for themselves doesn’t ultimately matter. It matters that we shared this time together and that we share a simple understanding—you are invited into my life should you choose to enter.
Bar Harbor was busy that afternoon, but not bustling like it is later in the summer or on holiday weekends. We roamed around the shops on Main St., many of them selling the same hats, sweatshirts, and blueberry-scented candles. Over time, I’ve learned some of the more interesting establishments—Sherman's Bookstore, In the Woods (a woodworking artisan), and Ben and Bill’s Chocolate Emporium. After we tired of the shops, we enjoyed some ice cream on the Village Green. Then everyone wanted to walk down to the waterfront and see this gazebo they’d heard so much about. The rest of them walked back down Main St., but Jon and I decided to take the long way.
One of my favorite things to do in Bar Harbor is to stroll down the little side streets, past the grand old homes, many of which have been turned into inns, until I reach the gravel footpath along the water’s edge. The path offers some of the best views in town—stately lawns and rose hedges on one side and the open waters of Frenchman Bay on the other—and is not heavily traveled. Historical placards tell the stories of the old houses, and one tells about a party boat that long ago ran aground on the rocks because its captain was partying a little too hard himself. Occasional benches flank the old sea wall and seem to take in the whole world from their humble vantage point. I like to imagine myself passing many hours there as an old man.
On our scenic route, Jon and I popped into a little antique store, where the owner thought I was an actor. It must have been the handkerchief I was wearing and my long hair that I was growing out to ill effect. We had circled the shop and were about to walk out the door when the woman interrupted her conversation with other patrons and demanded to know: “Are you a movie star?”
“Nope, not me,” I laughed.
“I just wanted to make sure you didn’t come into my store and not give me your signature,” she responded skeptically.
In hindsight, maybe I should have told her I was the star of an upcoming indie film. It would have been a fun ruse, and I’m confident my friends would have made me a Wikipedia page to sell the bit. I could have been local legend in Bar Harbor, which would have been worth it if someone treated me to lobster. But alas, I haven’t learned to be an opportunist.
After rejoining the group and paying homage to the gazebo, we wandered over to Side Street Café for dinner. Even though it was early, the restaurant was full, and we had to wait to be seated. Finally, we were escorted to a table and given drink menus, at which time Jessica realized she had “pulled a Meg” and left her ID behind. This time it was Joseph who rose to the occasion and treated Jessica to one of the delicious blueberry margaritas.
After dinner, we drove to the opposite side of Mt. Desert Island to watch the sunset at Bass Harbor Head Light, one of the sixty-five lighthouses in Maine and certainly one of the most iconic. This also proved to be a popular place, especially for photographers. There isn’t much to do there except watch the sky and listen to the waves, and even though I could have stayed for hours trying to capture the lighthouse in the glow of dusk, my friends grew restless, and the mosquitoes became very aggressive. Jon was being particularly persecuted and eventually started walking back toward the wooden staircase that led to the parking lot. When the rest of us caught up to him at the top of the stairs, he made a proud observation: “Local tip. If you stand here, the mosquitoes won’t bother you.”
“But you also can’t see the lighthouse from here,” I laughed.
“Good point,” he admitted.
Thankfully, we only had one day of rain. Since no one really wanted to go hiking that day, we decided to visit Winter Harbor only a few miles from the cottage. Aside from an emergency run to the IGA or a trip to get take-out from Chase’s, there isn’t much reason to go into town, but I wanted my friends to see the Winter Harbor 5 & 10, and I needed to get postcards to mail to my friends Natalie and Sara, with whom I’ve been trading tokens of travel for several years now.
The 5 & 10 really is a treat, even if you don’t need anything specific. It smells strongly of balsam, and the old wooden floors groan wonderfully underfoot. Almost everything you could need or want for a week at the cottage can be found in that tiny store—shovels, brooms, umbrellas, lightbulbs, water bottles, birdseed, coal for the grill, yarn and needles, hats, sweatshirts, raincoats, stationary, Christmas ornaments, fridge magnets, calendars, puzzles, books, board games, stuffed animals, etc. Joseph picked up a wooden ornament for our tree—an old fisherman wearing a bright yellow oilskin and smoking a pipe. I selected my postcards and purchased a copy of Blueberries for Sal by Robert McCloskey, the author of Make Way for Ducklings, who lived in and wrote about Maine for many years.
At the checkout counter, Jess alluded to the dreary weather. “A silver day on the coast,” the cashier said. I thought that was just a colorful bit of exposition, probably a localism, but as the day wore on, I realized that “silver” was the perfect word for it. It was more than just blue or overcast—even in the gloom, the day had a luster to it. And in the evening when the weak sun sliced through the gray clouds on the horizon, the water in Summer Cove truly did shine silver against the sullen coastline.
The closest Jon ever came to getting his lobster boat tour was the day we visited Southwest Harbor. The whole reason we drove to the west side of Mt. Desert Island that day was because Holly and I wanted to see a bridge.
Somesville is the oldest village on the island (founded in 1761) and is still little more than a village. There’s hardly anything to see in the town itself (aside from some quaint old New England structures) but the moment I saw a picture of the little footbridge over Somes Creek, I knew I had to see it in person. It’s the perfect marriage between Monet’s Japanese Footbridge painting and Lucy Maud Montgomery’s idyllic Avonlea. It most certainly is a place where Anne Shirley would have daydreamed, and it’s a place I think any artist or writer would find himself inspired.
Holly adores Anne of Green Gables, and when I showed her a picture of the bridge, she was also determined to see it for herself. (We had momentarily considered taking the ferry from Bar Harbor to Prince Edward Island during the week, but Canada’s border was still closed due to Covid, so this was as close as we were going to get.) The rest of the group indulged us, and even though the neighboring museum and historic Selectmen’s Building were closed, visiting the bridge proved to be a delightful afternoon excursion.
Since Southwest Harbor was only a few more miles down the road and we were getting hungry, we decided to drive into town in search of food. We drove almost to the end of Main Street, where we came upon the marina. Dozens and dozens of fishing boats rocked up and down in the water alongside charter boats and a large, very striking yacht. We walked down along the pier, admiring the boats, and I could tell Jon was searching for someone who would agree to take him out to check their traps. But we could only walk so far down the pier until a gate prevented us from going any further. Only boat owners were allowed beyond that point, and none of them paid us any attention. Jon could see the opportunity right in front of him, but it was just out of reach. We lingered for a little while, but we were getting hungrier, and the afternoon was slipping away.
After finding some coffee and pastries, we split up to look at a few of the shops. Jon, Joseph, and I wandered down a side street and came upon a little place simply called The Store. From the window we could see that it was a kind of antique store, and when we walked inside, we were met with no shortage of beautiful furniture, artwork, rugs, and other far-fetched treasures.
It was really more of a gallery than a typical antique store. To be sure, there were many old and precious pieces, but there were also new artisan-crafted wares layered throughout the room, all of the finest quality, and you could tell that everything in the store had been selected with the utmost care and consideration. Unlike many antique shops that are full to the brim and offer only narrow passages to walk through, this was a place you could hold a gathering. A place where you’d be able to recline in a chair with a drink and never run out of interesting, storied things to look at.
We were the only guests in the store, and while Joseph and I made our way around the space admiring paintings and lamps and models and wall-hangings, Jon quickly struck up a conversation with the proprietor. It turned out he had lived in California for decades and had opened this place in Maine as a sort of retirement project. He and Jon talked for almost half an hour, sharing anecdotes about California and exchanging life experiences. Nothing about this was unusual for Jon—he loves to tell stories, and he can draw stories out of strangers with ease.
Eventually Joseph and I joined them, and the conversation turned to a collection of beautiful chairs positioned around the room. The frames were built of teak wood, and the seats were woven of vibrant fibers. They had come from Nicaragua, where the trees were hand-selected and the fibers hand-dyed. The owner had a personal relationship with the craftsmen and said he occasionally visited them at their production facility. He offered for Jon to join him on his next trip to Nicaragua, where, he promised, Jon could select all his own materials and watch the artisans make him a chair. Jon was giddy—he’d made an authentic connection with one of the locals, and he’d received an invitation to travel to the forests of Central America. It doesn’t get much better than that. And though he never did wind up going to Nicaragua, he did order one of those beautiful chairs, which I still covet from time to time.
Prospect Harbor Lighthouse
Lobster Rolls and Blueberry Soft Serve
In addition to the places I wanted my friends to see, there were a few culinary experiences I wanted them to have. It is my opinion that anyone visiting Maine should be prepared to try at least two things—lobster roll and something blueberry. Most people know that Maine is synonymous with lobster (or “lobstah” as the Down Easters say), but few people know about Maine’s wild blueberries. According to the US Department of Agriculture, Maine is the world’s largest producer of wild blueberries. And everywhere you go in the Acadia area, you can find people celebrating the blueberry—blueberry preserves, blueberry car fresheners, blueberry tea towels, blueberry glassware, blueberry stationery, etc.
Taking a recommendation from my aunt and uncle, my friends and I decided to visit Me & Ben’s Dairy Crème, a seasonal family-run ice cream stand and snack shack just outside Winter Harbor. We had just finished our hike to Schoodic Head, and some refreshment was in order. At the window, I requested the blueberry soft serve that my aunt and uncle had insisted was some of the best ice cream they’d ever had. I must confess, I’m a bit of an ice cream snob, and soft serve is not typically my preference, but this seemed like the appropriate choice for the occasion. The lady behind the counter handed me a cone with one of the tallest ice cream twists I’ve ever seen, and with towering expectations, I dug in.
My aunt and uncle had not exaggerated. It was undeniably some of the best ice cream I’ve ever had, and the fresh blueberry flavor was just right for a warm summer afternoon. Many of my friends also sampled the blueberry soft serve along with several of the shop’s other flavors. Jess got her cone dipped in chocolate, which proved disastrous in the heat. We laughed as she used napkin after napkin to mop up the ice cream running down her arm. But despite Jess’s struggle, everyone so enjoyed their ice cream that we decided we must return later in the week when Lenny could join us.
To introduce my friends to lobster roll, I planned for us to have lunch at the Corea wharf, where fresh lobster comes right off the boats and is served up for eager guests. My friends had resolved to at least try lobster while in Maine, though Holly and Jessica were still quite apprehensive, and there was understandably some general skepticism about spending $26 on an experimental lunch. But everyone plucked up their courage and placed their orders.
It was a beautiful day, and while we waited for our food, we sat along the edge of the pier admiring the different lobster boats anchored in the harbor. It must have been lunch hour for all the lobstermen as well because most of the boats were deserted. Had there been any lobstermen about, I’m convinced Jon would have talked his way into an afternoon ride-along. Everyone’s food finally arrived, and to my satisfaction, they all seemed to enjoy it more than they had expected to. I took that as a victory.
There was one other culinary bucket list item I felt my friends needed to experience, and this one was perhaps the most controversial. At low tide, the rocky shore below the cottage is the perfect place to hunt for mussels. On a good day, you can find dozens and dozens of these creatures hiding among the tidepools and kelp beds, and fresh mussels are one of my favorite Maine delicacies.
Scavenging for mussels is not glamorous work, and it requires a bit of fearlessness as mussels are not the only creatures you’ll encounter. You must be willing to dig under slimy piles of kelp, cut your fingers on rocks and barnacles, and face down surprise crabs that also enjoy the nooks and crannies of the coastline. Some mussels are easily torn from the surface of a rock, but others must be wrenched from tight crevices. And slipping or twisting an ankle is always a possibility. But there is also something thrilling about this Pavlovian hunt. You may search for a long while and find no mussels, and then just when you begin to despair, you may push aside a clump of seaweed and find a whole cluster of oblong black shells. And that reward is enough to keep you going.
“It’s actually kind of addicting,” said Holly, who proved to be a master mussel hunter even though she had no intention of tasting one.
Preparing them is simple, if a bit time-consuming. You have to scrub the shells sort of aggressively and then rip out the beards, the strong fibers by which they cling to the rocks. Then you boil them until the shells begin to open. Drizzle on a little garlic butter, and they are ready to enjoy. They can be eaten with a fork, but many people prefer to slurp them right out of the shells.
We collected a few mussels on the second evening to go with our tacos, and though it took a great deal of persuasion, everyone at least tried them. They were not nearly as popular as the lobster, and I’m not sure Holly or Jessica will ever try another bivalve, but I’m proud of them for trying at least once.
Aside from these few items, I had not given much thought to our menu for the week. I assumed we’d eat at several local establishments, but that left many meals unaccounted for. Planning is not my gift, and I had my hands full securing our reservation at the cottage, helping everyone coordinate their travel arrangements, and drafting a rough itinerary for our time in Maine. Thankfully, there are several planners and initiative-takers among us, and Jessica decided to take charge of the menu. Since we’d be out exploring most days, she planned simple breakfasts and portable lunches. She also planned a couple nights for us to eat out as a group, a night for the girls to go out, and a night for the boys to go out. That left three evenings where we’d all eat together at the cottage, so she divided the group into dinner teams, appointing at least one pragmatist (i.e., schedule-conscious friend) to each team to ensure dinner was ready at a reasonable hour. Lenny and Jess prepared gnocchi with homemade sauce, one of their signature dishes. After poor success with the charcoal grill, Joseph, Meg, and I served fresh seafood. And Holly, Jon, and Jessica made tacos. On our nights out, we ate at some of the popular restaurants in Bar Harbor. Experiencing local cuisine is one of the most exciting parts of traveling, and I was thankful that my friends were open to trying new things. But I was also thankful for simple, familiar meals around the table at the cottage, where we laughed, teased, and reminisced like the patchwork family we’ve become.
A Humble Suggestion
Sometimes I look back on this trip and still can’t believe we pulled it off. But in other ways it’s not surprising. Most of us were approaching seven years of friendship, and we’d shared so many formative experiences in that time. Our lives had blended together during our chaotic college years, and our relationships had only deepened during the first years of floundering adulthood. By this point, we knew each other’s families, had friend-group lore, and understood many of each other’s strengths and weaknesses. At the time, I thought of this group vacation as a relational milestone, but in many ways, it was just a celebration of the friendship we already had.
Halfway through the week, Jon shared some pictures on Facebook to commemorate our friendship and our time together in Maine. He added these thoughts:
7 years. We first met at school, then went to church together, then many of us lived together, and then some of us married each other. Now, we vacation together. Excited to be in Maine for the week with these goons.
This was a touching tribute, but it also inspired a very unexpected and amusing response. A wonderful man from our church, who knew us all through college and has offered so much wisdom and guidance to us men especially, made a very bold recommendation:
Maybe some more of you should marry each other. Just sayin’.
To date, no more of us have married each other, though more of us are married or soon to be. Our friend Emma, who wasn’t able to join us on the trip because of work, married her husband Francisco earlier this year. And Jessica is preparing to marry her fiancé Bobby in March. Lenny and Jess have been married for over four years now, and our friend Tim, who also wasn’t able to join us in Maine, has been married to his wife Emily for over three years.
We’re also more spread out than we used to be. Emma and Francisco live in Clarkston, Georgia. Tim and Emily live in Raleigh, North Carolina. Jon is still in L.A. Meg is working as a missionary in North Africa, and Lenny and Jess are planning to move to Spain next year as missionaries. Jessica just bought her own home, where she and Bobby will live. We’re all approaching the end of our twenties, and the future promises to bring more big changes.
But we have been so blessed to be together for so many years. After college, we all stayed in Greenville for a time, and even though we have begun spreading out one-by-one, most of us are still concentrated in the Southeast. Our lives are still intertwined five years after graduating. How many people can say that?
I think most of us grew up with the expectation that we’d meet our spouses in college and be married right after graduation. That we’d start families and begin building little lives, leaving our college selves behind. This was normal for our parents’ generation. But that wasn’t our story. We all entered post-grad life without major milestones under our belts—just single young professionals looking for affordable housing, amiable roommates, and tolerable jobs. We didn’t necessarily have a roadmap for this transitional period of life, but we had each other, and together we’ve figured it out.
I’ve had the tendency over the last several years to think of this time as a holding cell—a waiting period before my “real life” begins. Before I fall in love and land my dream job and move to my dream city. But this is my real life, and I’m so thankful it is. These “extra” years with my friends are a gift I would never trade, and I’ve realized that there is such joy to be found in sharing the life you have with people you love, even if it is not the life you envisioned.
As I said earlier, taking all my friends to Maine began as a college pipe dream—something that would certainly never happen because our lives would surely splinter in different directions. But you can’t know what will happen, and you can’t anticipate how other people will change your life. If you’re open to it, you might just find yourself in a place you didn’t expect, with people you didn’t expect, unexpectedly happy.
Wide Enough: How Visiting LA Strengthened My Resolve to See the World with a Bigger Heart
from 09.18.22
I am hounded by a question that has driven history’s most unrestrained souls to shred the veil of the known world in a desperate reach for what lies beyond. A question that led to the discovery of the western hemisphere, the charting of earth’s remotest islands, the plunge into the depths of our galaxy. A question that was once reserved for those with pioneer spirits and yet, in today’s ever-connected global society, seems hardly novel: how can I live in this world and never see its wonders?
When I was a teenager, there was an idiom that middle and high school girls often misappropriated for team sweatshirts and early, uncurated photo dumps: “If you never go, you’ll never know.” This catchphrase was meant to inspire people to try new things, but it actually explains why humans have historically been content to live where they have always lived and perpetuate the rituals and routines they learned as children. If people don’t know what they’re missing, they generally won’t seek it out.
But because of social media, we do know what we’re missing. Or at least, we are given glimpses. And like me, so many people are no longer satisfied to live their entire lives and never experience the places that we see as we scroll ourselves to sleep.
For years, my hunger for travel has been steadily growing and my bucket list steadily expanding. Two years ago, on the verge of the pandemic, after a couple monotonous years as a young professional, this hunger intensified into a sharp and irrepressible urge to fling myself far from home, to see a place I had never seen, to answer the unrelenting question.
So I followed that old wisdom and went west with some of my best friends. We spent a couple unforgettable days in San Francisco and then traced the coastline down to Los Angeles. Even now that long weekend feels surreal, a sudden gush of opportunity amid the slow drip of ordinary days.
I had fantasized about California before — about the Pacific horizon that eventually becomes the Far East; about the giant trees that eventually become the sky; about the sunny, mid-century disposition of the Hollywood hills. But after our trip I pined for California. It had become real but no less magical.
Finally, in May of this year, I returned. My roommate Joseph and I traveled to LA to spend a long weekend with our friend Jon, who has been asking us to visit since he moved there in 2020. As we had only passed through In-N-Out Burger and LAX on our previous journey, this trip was an opportunity to be reunited with a dear friend and explore an iconic city for the first time.
Storied places like LA exist as much in our imaginations as they do in reality. And whether we’ve imagined them kindly or otherwise, our obligation as visitors is to arrive with an open mind. My incarnation of LA has always been a bit exaggerated and contradictory, so as I prepared for the trip, I worked on revising my expectations. I didn’t want to land in the city and realize I had romanticized it, as I’m prone to do. Nor did I want to get there and realize I’d succumbed to the easy cynicism people carelessly lob its way.
In the end, the fault of my imagination was not embellishing, but oversimplifying. LA proved far more complex and nuanced than I’d supposed, and had Jon not been there to show us the city, I don’t think I could have understood it at all.
The truth of LA lies somewhere between glamour and grittiness. Between the mythical, sun-soaked metropolis teeming with celebrities and the polluted urban sprawl plagued by horrific traffic and superficial industry wannabes. It is a real place full of real people, and like any place that people call home, it deserves to be considered beyond its caricature.
Reflecting on our time in LA has been like trying to solve an equation built of random, unrelated functions. We saw so much of the city in such a fast, haphazard manner, and because no part of LA can prepare you for the rest of it, I struggled to process it in the moment. I remember it not as a single place, but a cluster of places held together by a strange magnetism. The object of remembering our trip has been to produce the solution, to collate all the sites and all our adventures into a single, enduring impression of the city. But up until now, I have been stymied.
Though LA is famously sunny, our first two days in the city were gray and overcast. According to Jon, it was the rainy season, something the locals call “May gray” and “June gloom.”
“You can tell we’ve had a lot of rain recently because everything is a lot greener,” Jon noted as we maneuvered through traffic on our way to Hollywood.
This is what greener looks like? I wondered. I was already finding myself a little disappointed by how brown the landscape was. The hills surrounding the city were covered in scrub grass with only minimal vegetation. Trash littered barren medians and steep embankments on the sides of the roadways. Everywhere you looked was more concrete or asphalt or steel — the gnarly exoskeleton of the city’s monstrous infrastructure. I suppose perusing celebrity gardens in Architectural Digest had given me the impression that the city would be lush and green, but despite the palm trees, LA is no tropical paradise.
And yet, as I kept looking, bright flashes caught my eye. There were flowers bursting from the most inhospitable crevices and climbing the most austere surfaces. Bougainvillea scrambling up ugly walls and surging over chain-link fences. Jacaranda trees in full bloom staging their languid ballet between stickered streetlights and graffitied payphone boxes. And on top of these, flowers of every shape and color that I’ve never encountered. Surely even the Southeast with its magnolias, mimosas, and crape myrtles is not so vibrant. It’s a good thing Jon was driving, otherwise I would have been tempted to pull over and photograph each flower, especially in Malibu.
But the landscape was not the city’s only anomaly. The first place Jon took us was the Hope Center in East Hollywood, the soup kitchen and homeless refuge operated by his church. This place is certainly not a top tourist destination, but Jon is proud of the way his church serves his city, and this was perhaps the gentlest way he could acquaint us with one of LA’s harshest truths.
As we moved throughout the city over the next couple days, we were often confronted by homelessness. People did not approach us asking for charity, but everywhere there was evidence of need. Every time we waited at a traffic light beside a tent colony or passed by a person with their all their worldly possessions in a backpack, a sickness roused inside me, the same sickness I feel in my own city when I see a person standing on a median holding a cardboard sign or huddling against a wall outside the grocery store. I’d like to say this sickness is compassion, but often it’s just a nagging sense of obligation.
I was glad Jon showed us the Hope Center, but I could feel myself relax as we returned to the car and drove toward downtown Hollywood. I don’t know how to hold the need of the world and my own comfortable concerns at the same time, so I must banish one or the other from my mind. As we reached Hollywood Boulevard, I allowed myself to forget the problem of poverty, just like the priest and the Levite passing by on the opposite side of the road.
The juxtaposition was absurd. We had left a place devoted to the nameless and landed on a sidewalk (only a few blocks away) paved with the most recognizable names in the world. Before the trip, both Joseph and I had dismissed the boulevard as an expendable tourist trap, but as we walked the street and encountered the names of our favorite stars, we grew more and more enthusiastic. Joseph was practically giddy when he found the footprints of R2-D2 and C-3PO at the Chinese Theatre, and I was equally thrilled when I located the signature and handprints of Julie Andrews. Pretend as we might not to be swayed by celebrity, we all have our heroes.
Though most of the city defied comprehension, the irony of that neighborhood was immediately obvious. Enormous billboards advertising the latest in entertainment towered over the grungy streets and unattractive buildings — a shrine to fame and power in a place that has clearly been overlooked. A massive banner for the new Downton Abbey movie caught my attention. The Crawleys seemed particularly out of place in their finery, and their dignified expressions could easily have been mistaken for disdain. I know for certain that the dowager countess would never have stepped foot in Hollywood.
Do these people even care? I wondered. There were many on the streets who were clearly preoccupied with matters of survival, and I imagined that much of the population was already employed by the film and television industry. These billboards really belong in suburbs across America where people return from work catatonic and slump down on the couch to scroll Netflix.
Over the course of the weekend, we got to meet many of Jon’s friends, most of whom come from other places. I suppose this isn’t surprising — LA has the kind of magnetism that draws people from everywhere. But what is surprising is that this magnetism does not hold born-and-raised Angelenos. In fact, it seems to repel them.
On our first evening in the city, Jon took us along to a birthday party for one of his friends. After standing around awkwardly for a little while, I wound up talking to a girl named Abby who had grown up in LA. “We’re really rare,” she said. “Most people leave.”
A few minutes later, someone introduced us to a guy named Charlton, who was also from LA. When he and Abby realized they were both “lifers,” there was a mini celebration as though they’d just been reunited with a long-lost relative. It was the same solidarity I feel when I meet a Pennsylvanian in South Carolina, but I would never have expected it to be so scarce in LA, a place with such an established identity. I guess unlike most places, the culture of LA has been constructed mostly by outsiders rather than locals.
Most people come to work in the film industry. Among Jon’s friends we met a 19-year-old from Kentucky who is an aspiring screenwriter working for the famed director Ridley Scott; a 25-year-old producer who keeps her Emmy on her bedside table; a couple DPs; a few young actors; and some models. But lest you think Jon is rolling high with the rich and famous, all these people are industry nobodies. They are the nameless dreamers from other places who have made their pilgrimage to this place of opportunity. They are the anonymous talents who work tirelessly to keep Hollywood alive, hoping one day it will acknowledge them in return. And there are so many of them.
Being surrounded by so much creative energy was both inspiring and disheartening. On the one hand, these felt like my kind of people — storytellers, artists, romantics. People who care about art and language and fashion. People buzzing with new ideas to incarnate. Their passion and tenacity made me want to persevere, to spill all the ideas in my head like Legos on the floor and begin building something, anything.
But how could I hope to be heard among so many voices? How could I hope to stand out among people who are so original, so talented, so hungry for an audience? And if I were somehow to rise above the cacophony, would it not be at the expense of someone else just like me?
During our tour of the Warner Bros. studio, Jon, Joseph, and I came upon a tower of rejected screenplays that was much taller than any of us. A plaque explained that of the thousands of unsolicited scripts studios receive every year, only a couple ever become a film or television series. How many devastated writers did that paper pillar represent, and how many others were there just like it? Brendon Urie’s anguished voice floated through my head: “Every face along the boulevard is a dreamer just like you / You looked at death in a tarot card and you saw what you had to do.” Perhaps LA is just a siren luring artists to their doom with the promise of being heard and understood. And yet I hold so much admiration for the many souls who remain undaunted. “Oh the power, the power, the power of LA.”
As cruel as LA can be, it is the perfect city for Jon. He has finally found a place with enough dynamism and opportunity to match his own remarkable energy and enthusiasm. His fast, jerky driving always seemed a bit out of place in rural South Carolina, but it makes him a badass on the roads of LA. And his unmatched skill at parallel parking means he can always find a free parking spot near any destination. His portfolio of personal odysseys can rival the tales of LA’s most interesting people, and his enviable ability to develop quick and meaningful friendships is gold-standard currency in a city that thrives on connections and craves authenticity. In a place known to break the most stalwart spirits, Jon has proven resilient enough to survive and audacious enough to care. Amid all the impressive things we saw in LA, I found myself once again very impressed by my friend, whom I’ve known for almost eight years.
I was also very impressed by the people Jon has chosen as his friends. I had assumed that most of Jon’s LA friends led chaotic, fast-paced lives and that conversational though we might be, I could never actually keep up with any of them. I was wrong again.
We had a casual pizza dinner with Timothy, one of Jon’s closest friends and his former boss — a man who is extraordinarily busy yet made time to meet us because it mattered to Jon. Timothy rode up on a beautiful chocolate Vespa wearing one of his own customized leather jackets, a 70s inspired shirt that matched his argyle socks, classic blue jeans with a generous cuff, black-and-white chucks, and subtle jewelry. One of the most stylish men I have ever met, yet casual and approachable in a way that made his fashion sensibility seem incredibly attainable. We ate at his studio where he works on his jackets, designs interior spaces, and hosts gatherings for Christian artists. He is quite possibly one of the most refreshing people I have ever met — kind, sincere, lighthearted. When he prayed for our meal, he addressed God with a familiarity that made me envious. And when he told Jon to stop making split-second decisions based on the flip of his lucky peso, he did so with the good-humored firmness you’d expect of an older brother. It is no surprise that Jon considers him a dear friend and confidant. As we left dinner, Joseph said, “What a thoroughly delightful human being.” “For real,” I agreed.
On another evening Jon introduced us to SJ, Katie, and Peyton, three roommates who occasionally hosted Jon during his couch-surfing era and welcomed Joseph and I like we were old friends. We arrived at their apartment just as SJ was returning from the grocery store with food to make dinner. As we walked inside and surveyed the living area, Joseph and I simultaneously pointed to the pictures of the Rat Pack and Audrey Hepburn hanging on the walls. “Jon, don’t tell me your friends know about famous people,” SJ groaned. Jon had told us beforehand that people like to tease SJ for knowing nothing about pop culture. In fact, Katie and Peyton have made SJ TikTok famous for growing up Amish. Clearly, they were the ones who’d hung these photos — fitting as they are both actresses.
We followed SJ into the kitchen, where she began to unpack an assortment of groceries. Joseph and I offered to help prepare the meal. “What are you planning to cook?” Joseph asked. “I don’t know, whatever we can make with this stuff,” SJ responded blithely. It turned out to be stir fry.
While Joseph and I chopped vegetables and SJ cooked the chicken and rice, Jon regaled us all with stories from his recent trip to Peru (think a treacherous journey to Machu Picchu, a nighttime hike through the deadly Amazon rainforest, and swimming in a river with piranhas, all told in Jon’s animated style). Then we all crowded around the tiny dining table to enjoy the meal. SJ held out her arms to signal it was time to pray, and we all joined hands like my family used to do. I enjoyed listening to her pray just as I had enjoyed listening to Timothy, and as she finished, she gave my hand a firm squeeze — a familial gesture that seemed to nullify the fact that we’d met only an hour earlier.
I don’t remember everything we talked about over our meal, but I remember laughing a lot and thinking how much I was enjoying the company of these total strangers. Sadly, Jon, Joseph, and I had to eat quickly and leave in order to make it to Griffith Observatory by sunset.
Griffith Park was crowded because it was Sunday evening, and by the time we’d driven halfway to the observatory, we realized there would be no parking for us at the top of the hill. Jon, who has seen the observatory many times, told Joseph and I to get out and walk the rest of the way. He would turn around and wait for us at the park entrance.
Jon’s friend Sean was supposed to be meeting us at the observatory, and though he’d been one of the many people at lunch after church that morning, finding him in the large crowd was sure to be a where’s-Waldo situation. Not to mention that our only mutual connection wouldn’t be joining us.
Surprisingly, we found Sean right away, partly because he looks exactly like one of my old high school friends. He could have left once he found out Jon wasn’t coming — he lives right at the base of the park and hikes to the observatory multiple days a week. He certainly wouldn’t have been missing out on anything. But he graciously stayed and kept us company.
Sean moved to LA less than a year ago, but he said that he feels a kind of ownership over the park. Visiting as often as he does, and on weekdays when very few others are there, he must feel that it exists at least partly for him, the way I have often fancied certain quiet retreats exist only for me.
His claims to the park are certainly substantiated by his knowledge about it. He explained that much of the land had been donated to the city by the Griffith family. “It doesn’t seem right that one family ever owned all of this property,” I said somewhat indignantly, remembering how I felt upon learning that the Rockefellers had once owned much of Acadia National Park.
Sean patiently answered our questions about the observatory, about life in the city, about his job translating new compositions into sheet music to be recorded for films and television shows. Eventually I worked up the nerve to ask whether he could possibly be related to a kid I went to high school with on the East Coast. I suppose it wouldn’t have been too surprising since LA is mostly transplants and Sean himself is from Indiana. But as far as he knew, there was no connection.
Sean proved most longsuffering in following Joseph and I around as we photographed the observatory from every angle, angles he had seen a hundred times over. When the sun finally set, he led us down the dirt trail to his apartment, where we met Jon. “There have been mountain lion sightings in the park,” he said anecdotally as we traipsed down the dark path illuminated only by our phones.
As we neared the end of the trail, I asked him if he ever composed any of his own music. (I’d learned earlier that he studied music composition in school and that he plays several instruments.) He said he has done a couple freelance projects but doesn’t have much time or will to compose anything after staring at sheet music all day. As an aspiring writer who spends all day reviewing other people’s words, I sympathized. And yet his response hadn’t been begrudging. In fact, he’d said earlier (in earnest), “It’s so cool to work on music written by composers I’ve admired for so long and to know that I’m just a small part of the process.” I wonder how many people in LA, or anywhere for that matter, possess this kind of humility and contentment.
Our time in LA passed quickly, but it didn’t feel rushed. We saw a large swath of the city and met many people, but we also made time for slow meals and a long, lazy Saturday in Malibu. We were tourists, but also just visitors getting to share Jon’s life for a few days. In this way, it was a very human interaction with the city. Rather than leaving with pictures of all the landmarks, I left with a small sense of what it might be like to actually live there. As we taxied away from the airport, I was confident we’d made the best use of our time.
Joseph and I have taken several trips together, and at the end of each journey, we like to exchange our highlights and initial impressions. As is often the case, most of our favorite moments were the same (mostly spending time with Jon and meeting his friends). But my thoughts about the place itself were scrambled and incoherent.
Naturally, friends wanted to hear about our trip, and as I cobbled together brief synopses, one idea continued to stick out: it was different than I thought it would be. I had expected LA to be loud and flamboyant, but it had the subtler energy of people preoccupied — artists obsessed with their crafts, tourists enamored by the sites, impatient drivers intent on their destinations. I had expected it to be a paradise — vegetation green and fragrant, buildings golden in the sunlight, glistening ocean waves visible from anywhere. In reality, it was not quite Damien Chazelle’s La La Land. Ironically, I had also expected it to be dirty, brutalist, and degraded — Camelot fallen into disrepair. But only a cynic could see it that way. In short, I had anticipated a spectacle. But LA is real; it is human.
I should have understood this without needing to visit, and yet, we so often forget the humanity of people in other places. During lunch a few days after our trip, someone across the table made an incredibly callous joke suggesting that America would be better if California would fall into the sea. I could feel my indignation simmering as I tried to protest. How can we be so unfeeling?
Perhaps it is simply fear. Fear of people who are different from us and might outnumber us. Fear of people who are like us and might outperform us. Fear of not having enough space or enough time or enough control.
A couple weeks after returning from LA, I went to see Hamilton with my other roommate, Josh. The show is full of agonizing moments, but one that lingers with me from that performance comes right before the finale. After killing Alexander Hamilton in their duel, Aaron Burr sings remorsefully, “I should’ve known the world was wide enough for Hamilton and me.” In that moment, Burr realizes he will live the rest of his life with regret because his fight with Hamilton was based on the faulty assumption that they could not both succeed.
This is the refrain I’ve been repeating since LA, the truth I’m reminded of as I flip through Instagram at night and see the endeavors of artists, adventurers, humanitarians: the world is wide enough. It is so wide. There are so many places to see and so many cultures to experience, and contrary to what F. Scott Fitzgerald says, we will never reach the end of things “commensurate to [our] capacity for wonder.”
LA is a testament that our wide world is full of contradiction and complexity. My opportunities will often exist alongside someone else’s need — I must open my heart to embrace the one without guilt and acknowledge the other without reservation. The city is also evidence that there are many more voices to be heard, voices we need to fill up this great amphitheater called earth. We fear that making room for more voices will cause our own to be indistinct. But if some voices are willing to be less obvious, then all can be important — the way all the flowers in Malibu bloom side-by-side without diminishing each other’s beauty.
The world is wide enough, wider than we can comprehend. It is only our fear that would make it small. We are not suffocated by the size of the world, but by the size of our hearts.
Learning to Lament
from 12.22.20
One of the most devastating testaments to human history is the mass grave. Each time I read about the creation or discovery of these unnamed human deposits, I am seized by a sharp sense of loss. The tragedy of these graves is not only that souls have been taken but that they cannot be remembered. They cannot be mourned as individuals who were known, but only as strangers, figments of people. They cannot be resurrected in our hearts and minds. They are truly and finally gone.
As we approach the close of this long, wearisome year, I can’t help but feel that our innumerable tragedies have been blurred together, that we have heaped high our loss and devastation and walked away without claiming any of the fallen as our own. I don’t generally believe it is healthy to keep an inventory of sadness and disappointment, but in a period of global calamity when we have necessarily adopted a “stay strong and carry on” mindset, I fear we have failed to mourn things worth mourning.
Before saying much else, I should draw an essential distinction. Grief is pain that we experience, and therefore grieving is often involuntary. Mourning, however, is choosing this pain, whether it be our own or someone else’s. And as beings averse to suffering, this is not a choice we’re used to making.
We do not possess a sufficient mechanism for mourning, privately or collectively. This is because we don’t consider mourning a necessary discipline. Volumes have been written on the stages of grief and the road to healing, but we speak about these journeys as trials that must be endured, a means to an end. We never talk about choosing grief, about deciding to reckon with our pain and our mistakes.
I think we avoid personal mourning because we’re scared. We’ve been told it’s dangerous, that grief can swallow a person. And certainly this is true. But I believe the risk has to do with our means of mourning and not with the practice itself. Destructive mourning is engaging grief without hope. It is using pain as a drug or a stimulus rather than a means of growth. But there is a way to walk through the tunnel while keeping your eyes fixed on the light. There is a way to honor your pain without becoming defined by it.
I believe we avoid collective mourning because we are selfish. Choosing to share in other people’s pain demands that we acknowledge our responsibility to each other. We know instinctively that we are responsible to grieve with those we love, but what about mourning the suffering of the world? We do not want to believe that we are responsible to our fellow man because acknowledging that kind of responsibility would inhibit our freedom and destroy our comfort. And yet we are compelled to recognize a fundamental reality: we are not merely strangers sharing a planet; we are bound together as a human family. And the well-being of our family depends upon the well-being of each member.
Perhaps it’s the recognition of this mutual responsibility that riddles my mind with questions. How can we walk away from the anguish of this moment? How can we turn away from a field of graves without planting crosses? Do we have a plan to pause and recount all that’s been lost? In this season when our lives are consumed with anticipation, will we make equal room for agonizing remembrance?
I believe we must, for several reasons. First, mourning bestows significance because it requires sacrifice. It is choosing pain on behalf of someone or something else. Jesus demonstrates this principle in one of the most beautiful passages of the Bible. In John 11, Jesus travels to the village of Bethany, where his friend Lazarus has recently died. When he arrives he finds Lazarus’s sisters, Mary and Martha, grieving. Interestingly, they both make the same accusation: “Lord, if you had been here, my brother wouldn’t have died!” (CSB) Verse 33 follows: “When Jesus saw her crying, and the Jews who had come with her crying, he was deeply moved in his spirit and troubled.” He asks to see Lazarus’s tomb, and when they show him the way, John records, Jesus weeps.
Jesus knows that he is about to resurrect Lazarus. Before he even left for Bethany, he said, “Our friend Lazarus has fallen asleep, but I’m on my way to wake him up.” And yet he weeps. He chooses to validate Mary and Martha’s sorrow even though it will be taken away momentarily. He confers significance on Lazarus’s death even though he is about to restore his life. The effect is clear. The onlookers say, “See how he loved him!”
Second, mourning precipitates generosity. As I said earlier, we cannot mourn for others until we have recognized our responsibility to them. But once we have acknowledged our responsibility, we cannot simply lament people’s suffering. We must also serve their needs. This is the nature of authentic mourning: if we have truly shared another person’s pain, then we will make necessary sacrifices to provide healing.
Third, mourning reminds us that our pain matters, that it is a crucial part of who we are becoming. Mourning is giving ourselves permission to be changed by our pain. It is allowing ourselves to remain hollow in the places where something precious has been taken away. When we fail to mourn, we act as if our pain has no lasting effect, as if anything or anyone could fill the space vacated by another. But we know this is not true. We know that pain leaves permanent scars. We make a habit of celebrating happiness and achievement, but if pain is every bit as formative, every bit as valuable, why do we not make time to mourn?
Finally, mourning is a form of remembrance. It is not an accidental recollection or a lingering fragment of an otherwise forgotten song. It is intentional and thorough. It is recalling how a person carried himself, how he spoke, how he made you feel. It is retracing how a dream was born, why it was important, how it changed you. And in some mysterious way, remembrance lends a second life to things we believed dead. It preserves them from fading away and being forgotten.
One of my favorite Disney movies is Coco. The saddest scene in the movie is when Hector watches his old friend Chicharrón fade away from the Land of the Dead because no one remembers him in the Land of the Living. When Miguel asks where he has gone, Hector explains, “He’s been forgotten. When there is no one left in the living world who remembers you, you disappear from this world. We call it the final death.” And perhaps this is why I’m so scared of moving on from 2020 without taking time to mourn. What happens to the memory of all who’ve been lost if we do not remember? What happens to those who are grieving if we do not comfort them? What happens to their pain if it is never acknowledged?
At the beginning of the year, as I watched the world begin to unravel and losses start to multiply, I expected that we would have a day of reckoning. That when the tragedy finally ended, we would take time to mourn before rebuilding our lives. But the tragedy hasn’t ended, and there has been no season of mourning. In fact, it seems that as much as possible, everyone is moving on with life as usual — I feel myself moving on with life as usual. And I am alarmed. Are we really going to let this year lapse into the next without grieving for what’s been lost? Was it all worth so little?
I realize that pressing on toward the future is necessary and that hope is its own kind of homage to the lost. I know there are people striving valiantly just to survive, and their struggle is noble. But survival instincts have not kept us from mourning. We’ve been kept from lament by age-old saboteurs.
Excessive loss is numbing, and 2020 has been nothing if not excessive. This is the insidious nature of wars, famines, and pandemics — they do not merely steal the things we love; they rob us of the capacity to feel loss. Stalin, a man responsible for innumerable mass graves, understood this well. He is famous for saying “The death of one man is a tragedy. The death of millions is a statistic.” 2020 illustrates this reality perfectly. When Kobe Bryant died in a helicopter crash in January, people mourned him for weeks, as they were right to do. But no one has taken care to mourn the 1.7 million people who have died from COVID-19. Instead, people litter their feeds with pandemic memes, which are funny and refreshing but altogether inappropriate if we’ve lost sight of the true toll this virus has taken.
Another damaging trend I’ve seen on social media is the game of comparisons, which frankly I find sickening. A classic argument goes like this: “50 million people died of the Spanish Flu. Only 1.7 million people have died from COVID-19, which is a substantially smaller percentage of the world population. Why are we making such a big deal about it?” The simple answer is because it is a big deal. 1. 7 million deaths is always a big deal. Comparing tragedies to minimize the significance of one is simply inhumane. There is no scale of tragic value — tragedy is a fixed condition because it is based on the sanctity of human life.
I suspect we’ve begun comparing tragedies because we started comparing ideologies. Politicizing a catastrophe is one of the easiest ways to forget the human cost of it, and more than ever before, it seems we are prepared to wage wars of secondary importance. Our human concerns have been replaced by political interests, and we have become consumed with national policy while failing to consider our personal responsibility. We’ve fueled arguments of ignorance while ignoring the tragedy that is certain. We’ve become warriors instead of healers, crusaders instead of care-givers, and I can’t help but think our words are meaningless to those we’ve abandoned in their grief.
Finally, and perhaps the most subtle, is the temptation of escapism. Honestly, nothing has seemed so alluring (and harmless) this year as a retreat from reality. In fact, escapism has become the marketing strategy for the most cunning brands. And the surprising thing is that most aren’t even selling a fantasy; they’re simply promising a sense of normalcy. Certainly a respite is necessary at times — this is why we write stories and build summer cottages. But if we can no longer meet the need of the world, then our sanctuaries have become crippling instead of empowering. So I want to call us back to the violence of the moment, to untempered reality, to necessary remembrance.
As I gaze across the ruin of this year, I see all the shallow graves where I haven’t wept and all the charred debris that I never bothered to revisit. But more haunting, if I turn and strain my eyes toward the horizon, I see a future where none of it is remembered. So before I go any further, I am going to turn back and plant roses in the rubble, and I am going to gather the embers and let them burn against my body. Come with me . . .
. . . . .
I choose to remember the murder of Ahmaud Arbery. Breonna Taylor. Elijah McClain. George Floyd.
I mourn for their families who are still waiting to receive justice. Who everyday see their smiles and remember their potential but can never again hold them in their arms.
I lament a society that propagates violence against persons of color. A society where people must take to the streets to remind us their lives matter. A society that in every way has betrayed, subjugated, and dehumanized people made in God’s own image.
I choose to grieve for the 1.7 million souls who have been taken from us by COVID-19. I think how so many of them were forced to die alone, unable to clutch the hand of a spouse or gaze into the eyes of their children. I am overwhelmed by the fact that my family will be together this Christmas but so many will forever have an empty seat at their dinner tables.
I ache for healthcare workers who daily watched these people die. Whose best was not enough. Who had to forsake their own families in order to save others. Who must be haunted by the shadow of death.
I mourn for the elderly, isolated in nursing homes, who have not felt the embrace of a loved one all year. I think how they must feel time slipping away, and with it their hopes of ever experiencing freedom again. I worry that they feel forgotten, and I wonder if anyone will ease their loneliness on Christmas Day.
I grieve for canceled graduations, stolen weddings, and thwarted family vacations. For the inability to honor an achievement, celebrate love, and find togetherness.
I lament the loss of presence. All the many hours that we had planned to spend together that we spent alone instead.
I mourn that choosing to spend time with each other is always a complicated decision. That a hug is a risk and a handshake can cause regret.
I hurt for those who cannot go home this Christmas.
I grieve that young children are growing up in a world where they cannot read the expressions of strangers. Where they must cover their own precious faces. Where they cannot hug their friends.
I remember those who lost their livelihoods this year. Who worked hard and built their impossible dreams into something tangible only to have them swept away.
I fear for the poor and vulnerable of the world whose plight has been exacerbated by the pandemic. Whose needs have gone unmet and overlooked. For those who have suffered neglect and abuse. For the ones in isolation tortured by their own minds.
I mourn for those whose private sadness and disappointment have been overshadowed by the world’s trouble. For those who were never met in their hurt.
And perhaps most of all, I lament our inability to show kindness and understanding. I grieve that tribulation has revealed anger and selfishness. That more than ever we seem incapable of listening to those we disagree with and unwilling to surrender our rights on behalf of another. That for all our doctrine and ideals, we have not found a way to live at peace with our neighbor.
. . . . .
After calling us to mourn, I would be remiss if I didn’t invite us to hope. We don’t usually consider these activities compatible, but they exist in necessary tension. Mourning reminds us that we need hope; hope keeps our mourning from turning to defeat.
I find my hope in someone who knows all my pain and sadness. Isaiah 53:3 says, “He [Christ] was despised and rejected by men, a man of suffering who knew what sickness was. He was like someone people turned away from; he was despised, and we didn’t value him.”
One of my favorite names for Jesus is Emmanuel, meaning “God with us.” This is what we celebrate at Christmas: that Jesus willingly entered our broken world and shared our pain. But he did more than taste our suffering — he met our deepest need. Isaiah 53:4–5 says, “Yet he himself bore our sicknesses, and he carried our pains; but we in turn regarded him stricken, struck down by God, and afflicted. But he was pierced because of our rebellion, crushed because of our iniquities; punishment for our peace was on him, and we are healed by his wounds.” By dying for our sins, Jesus provided a way for us to be restored to God. And this is the hope that rises above any circumstance: that we can belong to a God who sustains the world and has promised to one day redeem it.
“Then I heard a loud voice from the throne: Look, God’s dwelling is with humanity, and he will live with them. They will be his peoples, and God himself will be with them and will be their God. He will wipe away every tear from their eyes. Death will be no more; grief, crying, and pain will be no more, because the previous things have passed away.” Revelation 21:3–4
A Road Worth Taking
from 11.25.20
The possibility churned in my stomach. California. Just for the weekend. Just for the heck of it. It was the kind of sudden opportunity that causes you to wonder how many others slip by unrecognized.
The occasion was perfect for entertaining an improbable fantasy. Late appetizers with close friends in an empty restaurant, a new year stretching out in front of us. The kind of conversation with enough sustained enthusiasm to bolster even the wildest of dreams.
I expected the idea would die, put out with a splash of common sense. Who would commit to the luxury of a weekend jaunt to the West Coast? But still, I desperately wanted to go. And once I had entertained the idea, I almost needed to go.
I was disappointed with my life— not the totality of it, but the day-to-day monotony that had set in slowly like a suffocating blanket of humidity. I realize this sounds extraordinarily selfish, but it is the truth. Though my life has been littered with blessings, I was struggling to see past a job that engaged none of my creativity and an unshared apartment that was growing lonelier all the time. A year and a half after college, the grand expectations I once had felt vague and unreachable. And while I knew a trip to California could not change any of these circumstances, I hoped it would rescue me from this rut.
Fortunately, my friends Matthew, Tim, Joseph, and Jon were just as enthusiastic about the trip. And so, without lengthy deliberation or weeks of waffling back and forth, we booked it. San Francisco. Pacific Coast Highway. Los Angeles.
I was running back and forth across my apartment, jumping up and touching the ceiling, everything short of disturbing my landlords upstairs. “Everything changes,” I wrote. “We’re going to Cali!!!!”
That was February 17th.
. . . . .
Turns out it was a bad year to book a spontaneous trip. By March everyone’s dreams were endangered, and as the months wore on, they folded and slipped away, debris in the unrelenting current. My parents and my brother never made it home from South Africa. Our biannual family vacation to the Outer Banks was canceled. A week at my Aunt Pearl’s cottage in Maine became another hope deferred.
We waited until the last possible minute, but finally we were forced to cancel our trip to California. “This is hardly a tragedy,” I wrote, ashamed I could harbor such self-pity while hundreds of thousands of people around the world lay dying. “But trying to keep it in perspective hasn’t brought me any comfort.”
The worst part was not that I might never see the Golden Gate Bridge or the California coastline. It was the loss of a designated weekend to spend with some of my closest friends, a rare gift in a busy world. And the fear that I might never escape the prison of routine — that my days would unfold in an endless strain of keystrokes and windowless rooms.
It’s ironic that in a year of unprecedented events, I was most terrified of the mundane. Maybe I have an unhealthy lust for the extraordinary. Or maybe, when reduced to its most basic structure, the life I’ve chosen is not the life I want. Either way, I’d staked quite a lot on this trip, and the thought that it might never happen was sickening.
We might have spared ourselves a lot of heartache if we’d just resigned ourselves to the initial disappointment. But we remained determined to go and were met with no shortage of adversity.
A Brief Timeline
May: Fortunately, the airlines gave us flight credits, and we are able to rebook the trip. We decide to forgo LA and spend all our time in San Francisco. We gamble on the weekend of September 18–21, hoping travel restrictions will be lifted by then. The trip is on again!
July 20: Our return flight from San Francisco to Atlanta is canceled by the airline due to financial strain brought on by Covid. We scramble to book another flight home. The closest flight is out of LA. We book it. Trip salvaged.
July 28: Our flights to San Francisco are rescheduled by the airline, costing us an entire day on the ground. There should be a better alternative, but there isn’t. The best we can do is a ten-hour layover in Vegas and a late flight to San Fran. Guess we’re going to explore Sin City.
August 18: An unexpected work obligation arises. Seriously, it’s non-negotiable. Our flight from Atlanta to Vegas is too early. It won’t work. We cancel the entire trip and rebook it for the following weekend, September 25–28.
September 9, two weeks out: Apocalyptic images of San Francisco emerge online. The sky is bright orange. The California wildfires have gotten close. The Air Quality Index is over 200. People are encouraged to stay inside. We purchase N-95 respirators and hope they won’t start canceling flights.
September 19, one week out: I find out that I’ve been directly exposed to Covid. The chances of testing positive are high. If I do, I can’t go, and neither can Joseph since we’re now roommates. The others won’t go without us. By now the air quality is healthy again and all other obstacles have been overcome. But the entire trip is in jeopardy.
I got tested as soon as possible and waited two agonizing days for the results to come back. I checked the health portal compulsively, wanting desperately to know one way or the other. When the results finally arrived, I was terrified to open the link. Up until that moment, I’d been convinced I was negative. Now I was sure the opposite was true. How would I tell the other guys I’d ruined their trip?
Negative.
It was the kind of relief and happiness that cannot be channeled into deliberate action. I had so many people to tell, and I didn’t know who to text first. I said a guilty but sincere prayer of thanks, knowing that had I been positive, in the absence of anyone else to blame I probably would have blamed God.
And so, after seven months of planning and hoping, we were finally taking our “spontaneous” trip to Cali.
. . . . .
The first stop was Vegas, though it was really more of a detour. We would really have liked to go straight to SF, but we decided to make the best of our pit stop in the desert. First, we enjoyed breakfast at Egg Works. (If you’re ever sitting in LAS with time to spare, it’s worth the Uber.) Then we found a local coffee shop so Tim could work on a grad paper.
We spent the late afternoon exploring the iconic Strip. I’m glad we did because I was always vaguely curious, but aside from the musical fountains outside the Bellagio, we found it underwhelming. “It’s like spending the entire day at a big outdoor mall,” Joseph observed. He wasn’t wrong. With a kitschy Eiffel Tower replica, an improbable number of sports cars, and tourists toting 100 oz. margaritas, the whole place felt like it was made of oversized happy meal toys. It had all the hallmarks of a place everyone comes to visit but no one comes to stay.
But as we flew over the city on our departure, I realized that many people do in fact call Vegas home. Hundreds of subdivisions glowed under the night sky, a sprawling suburbia bounded by mountains in the middle of absolutely nowhere. Maybe that’s the alluring paradox of Vegas — to be somewhere and nowhere at the same time. From the plane window, with all the lights glowing orange, the city looked remarkable. Then we passed over the mountains, and it was gone.
We arrived in San Francisco too late to see anything, but by that point Tim, Joseph, Matthew, and I had been up for almost twenty-four hours anyway. Jon picked us up at the airport, and we found our way to our Airbnb in Outer Mission.
We’d made it. We’d set foot in a place that had only been a pipe dream. As many times as I’ve traveled, it still amazes me that you can wake up on one side of the world and find yourself on the other side of it by the end of the day. How miraculous that every place is connected to every other place, that the life we live is only as small as we make it. Why don’t we take the road more often?
. . . . .
I have barely alluded to my traveling companions, so allow me to introduce them properly because they’re some of my best friends and they’re worth knowing.
Matthew is a senior Social Studies Education major at North Greenville University. We’ve been friends since my senior year of college when he became an honorary member of our campus house. Matthew is one of the most enjoyable people to be around. He is easy-going, good-humored, and funny. He took it upon himself to be my hype-man for the trip, a role he is perfectly suited to as one of the most positive and affirming individuals I know. The best part is that none of his kindness is affected; he is always sincere, earnest even. A friend described him as the human equivalent of a golden retriever, and while that may not be the most flattering comparison, I understand the sentiment. Matthew is always ready to have fun. While waiting for a shuttle at the airport (after midnight), he and I completed a two-man luggage-cart race course in under a minute. Just saying. Matthew gets married in December, and I already know it’s going to be hype.
Joseph is my roommate and one of the stabilizing forces in my life. His intellectual rigor, straightforward manner, and motivation to improve challenge me constantly. He is the kind of person who pushes you to grow by empowering you rather than tearing you down. He is also a promising candidate for world’s most interesting man. He can transition from watching Formula 1 to belting a musical number to demonstrating a jiu-jitsu maneuver with ease. He was the mastermind of our trip and the primary reason it was such a success. A strategist at heart and the only one of us who’d ever spent a significant amount of time in San Francisco before, he mapped out an itinerary, booked an Airbnb, and navigated our excursions throughout the city. He insisted that the Ghirardelli store at Fisherman’s Wharf had unrivaled ice cream and that we must stop there or he would not join us on the trip. His insistence turned out to be more than warranted, and I am grateful to have a roommate who feels so passionately about ice cream.
Tim is earning his masters degree in counseling, working as a behavioral therapist, and planning a wedding — a busy man to be sure. To be fair, the trip was supposed to happen before he started grad school and before he was engaged. But he set aside wedding planning for the weekend and brought along grad work so he could spend a weekend with the boys. Tim is one of the most wholesome people to spend time with. He listens well, chooses his words carefully, and remains flexible. His easygoing nature makes those in his company feel at ease. He is highly perceptive, and I always admire how well he understands his friends. When decisions are being made, Tim will express an opinion, but he never has to be the one making the final call, even though he’s one of the wiser, more mature 25-year-olds I know. Somehow he managed to complete a grad paper over the course of our trip, and I never heard him complain about it. He gets married in January, and I couldn’t be happier for him because he has found someone equally kind and admirable.
Jon is a bird on the wind. Right now he is living in LA, working as an interior design assistant and charting his future, which I truly believe could take him anywhere. Jon is the most daring, adventurous person I know. He is always traveling somewhere or exploring something, often without a plan. His networking skills are unparalleled— he can find a friend or a friend of a friend in any city. Jon’s energy and intensity have always astounded me, mostly because I am no match for either. Quite honestly, a low-energy introvert like me could find these qualities exhausting, but over the years I’ve come to admire Jon’s fervor, his ability to seize opportunity, and his visionary, unshackled mind. Just the other week he texted me, “Wanna hit South Africa [in the] next week or two?” If only. Jon chauffeured us around for the weekend. The aggressive drivers of LA had prepared him perfectly for the inner-city hills and winding ascents of San Francisco, and we saw the city with a speed few would venture.
Left to right: Joseph, Matthew, Jon, Tim
San Francisco is the improbable marriage of nature and metropolis. Never have I seen these two opposing environments blend together so seamlessly. In fact, I almost considered them mutually exclusive. When in New York, you are decidedly in the city. When in the Blue Ridge Mountains, you are clearly in nature. But in San Francisco, you can experience both at once. This is because the land was not cleared away to make room for the city. The slopes were not leveled or the water pushed back. Instead the city was draped like a necklace over the collarbone of the coast. Even when driving the downtown grid, you can feel the undulations of the earth beneath. Standing on the beach, you can see the bridge blush in the setting sun. And you can sense that creation and construct are at peace.
And maybe this is the philosophy that governs the whole city — that we can be at peace with each other. San Francisco is sometimes ridiculed for being the city of “anything goes.” And while there may be a degree of truth in that, what I saw were people profoundly comfortable in the place they call home, and more importantly, comfortable with each other.
I suspect it has to be this way because everyone lives so close. After all, it’s the second most densely populated city in America. The little houses climbing the hillsides are crowded together like too many friends squeezed in the back seat of a car. To live there is to live with other people.
I admit this is purely speculative, but I imagine years of proximity have taught people how to live together in a way most suburbanites can hardly imagine. Often, space makes withdrawal easier, and perhaps by choosing the acreage and “elbow room” of the suburbs, we’ve lost the ability to coexist with others. We’ve turned distance into a luxury, and when we find someone’s lifestyle or ideals troublesome, we put up a fence, plant a hedgerow, and increase our degree of separation. Could it be that what looks like liberalism is actually just kindness?
The thing I remember best about San Francisco is its movement. Bikers, runners, hikers — people with momentum. But it wasn’t the mechanistic pounding of industry or the frenzied dash of a large city. It was youthful, organic, free-spirited.
We spent Saturday evening at Marshall’s Beach watching the sunset. Among the children playing in the water and the bride with her dress blowing in the breeze was an elderly man practicing martial arts in the sand. He moved gracefully and decidedly to meet an invisible opponent, his focus erasing all the seaside revelers. It was just him and the thrusts of the ocean.
On Sunday morning, as we left our Airbnb for a second day of exploration, we passed a middle-aged woman doing calisthenics in the neighborhood park. She windmilled her arms vigorously and marched in place, high-step after high-step, oblivious to our amused staring.
Later that afternoon as we passed Washington Square, a local band was performing for clusters of people spread out on blankets around the park. A lone women, past middle age, hair streaked with color, was dancing in front of the lead singer, twirling an umbrella and waving her arms. She was clearly having the time of her life, and no one seemed to mind.
Maybe these people simply didn’t care what others thought. The dancing woman may even have been drunk. But it’s not hard for me to believe that the city breeds the young at heart.
I too felt young while I was there. As if most of life’s opportunities lie ahead of me rather than behind me. I think that’s why I like big cities — they testify to possibility. Their scope, brightness, and diversity are more than one person can ever absorb. They make your dreams seem, if not more plausible, at least less foolish. And San Francisco, with its fault-line skyscrapers, tapered houses, and mile-long bridges, is an ode to once-foolish things become possible.
Even before we left for California, I knew I’d be writing about this trip, and I imagined this travelogue would be full of noteworthy reflections like Steinbeck’s Travels with Charley. I hoped that on this trip I would intuit some undiscerned truth about human nature or uncover a veiled facet of the American psyche. That I would be able to report dazzling discoveries from our journey west. But I am not Steinbeck, and we were not traveling the country in the gallant Rocinante.
We were crammed into Jon’s Subaru, Juniper, pressing into each other on every split-second turn, bracing against the front seats as we sped through the course of inner-city hills like a rogue rollercoaster.
Steinbeck had time on his side, but we were trying to see as much as we could in two days. Thanks to Joseph’s careful planning (and Jon’s *opportunistic* driving), we made the most of forty-eight hours.
I suppose a travel expert would distill the city to five must-see attractions and attempt to persuade you that, should you see those five sights, you will have seen the city. But San Francisco is irreducible.
The silent magnificence of Muir Woods. The way you stand almost above the Golden Gate Bridge at Battery Spencer and watch the morning mist blow through the steel cables. The unparalleled view of the city from Coit Tower. The crowds at Fisherman’s Wharf cheering on the dueling sea lions. The ferry tour of the bay. The lovely man at the antique shop along the Wharf who let me try on a Stetson and pretend to be important. The many parks that feel like they belong to a little neighborhood rather than a big city. I cannot conscionably tell you to skip any of it.
But, I suppose with any experience, good or bad, it is helpful to break it apart. Somehow this compartmentalization enables us to remember with greater precision, greater intensity. As we neared Greenville on our journey home, Joseph asked Matthew, Tim, and I what our favorite part of the trip was. We all had the same two answers.
The first was Marshall’s Beach on Saturday evening. The little beach rests below the Golden Gate Bridge and faces the Pacific. It’s recommended as one of the best places in San Francisco to watch the sunset. We spent over an hour here, observing the other beach-goers, arguing over which one of us had been cat-called on our way down the trail, and watching the sun blaze its way around the curve of the earth. Matthew and Jon found a rock and tried to punt it like a football, something Jon quickly regretted. Joseph, in his enthusiasm to capture a video of the action, had his shoes soaked by the incoming tide. Tim removed his shoes and waded into the water, explaining, “I can’t come here and not at least put my feet in the Pacific Ocean.” I took more pictures on that beach than I will ever be able to use. We were in no hurry to leave. When would we ever be together again under the dying glow of the western sun with the spray of the Pacific hanging in the air?
The second was dinner in Chinatown on Sunday evening. This was on our itinerary from the beginning, but we hadn’t figured on most of the restaurants closing down early on Sunday night. After visiting a fortune cookie factory and finding the Dragon’s Gate, we wandered around aimlessly, searching for a place to eat. Finally, we stumbled across an open place with tables spread out in the street. With the light from the shop windows and the Chinese lanterns hanging above, it looked like a movie.
After a busy day in the city and an hour of walking through Chinatown, we were feeling indecisive. We sat down and ordered waters before we’d even decided if we would stay. The waitress kept asking us if we were ready to order. At least three times we asked for five more minutes to look at the menu. By the time we finally made up our minds, the waitress was a bit exasperated. “Finally,” she let slip. We all started laughing. “I should keep my mouth shut,” she scolded herself. This lapse in etiquette made her cuter than she already was.
I have to admit, for one short moment I thought, “Maybe I should ask for her number. What would I have to lose? I’ll never see her again.” That was the point I decided and chose to keep my mouth shut. Jon, however, was more seriously infatuated. We spent most of dinner trying to persuade him not to ask for her number.
I can’t even remember most of what was said, but we spent a long while laughing, sharing food, and enjoying the warm glow of the street. Though we never acknowledged it, I think we were all aware in the moment just how special it was.
On our way back to the Airbnb, we realized we weren’t far from Lombard Street, so we decided to make a detour. After one trip down the serpentine road, Jon wanted more. So we drove around the block again to wind our way down a second time. This time Matthew and I rode down hanging out the sunroof. The night was cool, and the lights of the city shone silver. The beauty and the brevity burned like a sharp inhalation of cold air. A second time was still not enough for Jon — he wanted to ride out the sunroof. So we drove around the block a third time and made our way down the brick slope.
Jon’s adrenaline must have peaked then because we were speeding home to the Airbnb. I think we hardly stopped the whole way. It was risky, but I didn’t care. It felt like freedom.
. . . . .
We left the city early Monday morning so we could drive the coast down to LA. If ever there was a scenic route worth losing sleep for, it is the Pacific Coast Highway. It is the road on the edge of the world.
That morning the ocean was completely covered by clouds, which swept off the water and barreled into the mountains. I rode out the sunroof again as we wound around the tight corners of the coastline. We passed the stately pines of Big Sur; the elegant form of the Bixby Bridge; and the green fields of Carmel, which are home to some of the most privileged cows in the world. Yes, cows. On the California coastline. Completely oblivious to the fact that most of their species do not graze on a cliffside by the ocean.
There isn’t much along this road except random driveways that disappear into the woods, occasional inns facing the ocean, and overpriced gas that’s the best deal around. I can’t help but think it would be lonely to live there on the edge of the world. And yet it’s like the city in some ways — endless, incomprehensible, irresistible. No wonder it beckons to insatiable imaginations.
I wish my jumbled musings would lead to a conclusion, to some point by which I may justify having taken this trip. But as it turns out, even Steinbeck did not find exactly what he was looking for. He writes, “It would be pleasant to be able to say of my travels with Charley, ‘I went out to find the truth about my country and I found it’ . . . But what I carried in my head and deeper in my perceptions was a barrel of worms.”
I don’t think this trip has saved me from a rut or lent me any profound insight for living, but I think Steinbeck would say — and I’d agree — that these trips are worth taking.
“This is a once-in-a-lifetime thing.” We said it over and over. That’s how we justified this trip. But maybe we didn’t need to justify it, and maybe we bargain away opportunity by assuming we’re only allotted so much.
When we made it home and went back about our lives, I had to write the guys to thank them for being my friends and for taking the road with me. If there is one thing I did learn on this trip, it is how deeply I love and respect each of them. I finished the letter by breaking our pact: “I really hope this wasn’t just once in a lifetime.”
To You for This Moment
from 06.03.20
I have seen so many people expressing their anger, frustration, and grief over the killing of George Floyd, and I am exceedingly thankful that this seems to be a moment of awakening for our nation and for the American church in particular. You certainly don’t need to hear another opinion on recent events, but as a writer I always want my pen to plead the cause of justice. I want it to tell the stories of the oppressed and disenfranchised, and I want it to promote empathy, understanding, and human dignity. So these are the words I feel led to say right now.
To My Black Brothers and Sisters
I want you to know that I was twenty before I acknowledged the reality of racism in America. Twenty before I considered that other Americans might have a different experience than me. Twenty before I admitted there could be racism in my own heart.
The killings of Michael Brown, Walter Scott, and Alton Sterling finally stirred my heart and my conscience. Desperate to understand, I turned to a dear friend. I asked him what it was like to be black in America because no one had ever told me it was different than being white. He thanked me for asking, but he must have wondered how I could be twenty and still so self-centered and unaware.
I am sorry that I lived in ignorance so long. I am sorry that I was blind to your suffering and unconscious of the ways I may have contributed to it. I don’t want to be blind anymore.
That conversation with my friend was a profound moment for me. It changed the way I see the world. It changed the way I relate to people of color. For a long time I thought that moment had redefined who I was, made me an “enlightened” individual.
But, my brothers and sisters, I want you to know I have failed you since then.
I have seen your pain, and I have responded half-heartedly. I have been satisfied decrying racism on social media. I have been content challenging the views of friends and family in private. I have been at peace complaining about racism with my white friends as though denouncing a bully I have never stared down. I have done these things intending to support you and to demonstrate my love for you.
But the extent of my response has not matched the magnitude of your suffering. And that is because I have not listened long enough or close enough. I have listened with white ears instead of human ears. And for that I am so sorry. I don’t want to respond disproportionately anymore.
Finally, my brothers and sisters, and worst of all, I have found a way to make your pain about me. What began as an empathetic journey to understand your struggle became about the journey itself. It became about proving I wasn’t racist and proving I was a good person. It became about my own insecurity and my own concept of what needed to change. And truthfully, playing the role of the compassionate crusader was intoxicating. I thought of myself as somewhat of an internet hero in the fight against racism, and your pain became my platform. I amplified my own voice instead of yours. While lamenting white privilege, I used my own to be heard.
I am exceedingly sorry. I beg your forgiveness.
Please know that from this day forward I am committed to shedding my ignorance. I want to be constantly learning and constantly drawing closer to the truth. I am committed to responding to racism in practical ways. I want to do something about racism instead of just talking about it. And I am committed to never capitalizing on your pain. I will support you in any way that I can without attempting heroism. Because you need friends, not heroes. You are people, not a cause.
Please help me do this. Please help me be an instrument of justice and reconciliation. Please help me love you well.
To My White Brothers and Sisters
I hope that by reading the section above you realize I am a broken, selfish person trying clumsily to do the right thing. I have no judgment to cast. I also want you to know that I understand you are on a journey. Awakening to the reality of racism in our world and in our own hearts is a process — a process we are all undergoing. My black friends have shown me so much grace along this journey, and I have the same grace for you.
I hope the events of the past month have accelerated your journey and have brought you to the firm conclusion that racism is still very real and that we are obligated to fight it. I hope that painful as it is, you have watched the lynching of Ahmaud Arbery. I hope you have read Breonna Taylor’s story. I hope you have watched the video of a police officer kneeling on top of George Floyd for ten minutes as he begged for air and prayed to his mother. I hope you are convinced beyond a shadow of a doubt that people of color in America are plagued by injustice.
But if these events have not convinced you, all you must do is look at Scripture to be persuaded. Racism is apparent in the Bible from the Old Testament to the New Testament. The Egyptians enslaved the Israelites because they feared them. The Jews and Samaritans hated each other because of blood status. God had to send Peter a vision to convince him that Christ had invited all people into the family of God. Racism is evident in ancient civilizations, among God’s chosen people, and in the heart of one of Jesus’ own disciples. This reality indicates that racism is part of our sin nature and therefore common to all humanity.
In 1 Corinthians 11, Paul confronts the church at Corinth about factions that preclude the poor from participating in the Lord’s Supper. Likewise in James 2, James warns believers about showing favor to the rich and excluding the poor. These passages demonstrate that the human heart is prone to prejudice and partiality. By nature we create artificial distinctions among people and use them to determine each other’s value.
This behavior disregards God’s work in Creation and rejects the truth of the gospel. For we know that God created mankind in His image, and therefore, all people are equal representations of God and equally valuable. We also know that Christ came to deliver all people from the bondage of sin and welcome them into the kingdom of heaven. In Ephesians 2:14–19, Paul encourages the Gentiles, “For he [Christ] is our peace, who made both groups one and tore down the dividing wall of hostility. In his flesh, he made of no effect the law consisting of commands and expressed in regulations, so that he might create in himself one new man from the two, resulting in peace. He did this so that he might reconcile both to God in one body through the cross by which he put the hostility to death . . . So then, you are no longer foreigners and strangers, but fellow citizens with the saints, and members of God’s household” (CSB). This passage reminds us that Christ is making a family of people who were once alienated from each other.
These verses also bring to mind Galatians 3:28. Paul says, “There is no Jew or Greek, slave or free, male or female; since you are all one in Christ Jesus” (CSB). We see that Christ has obliterated distinctions that kept us apart and desires to make us all His sons and daughters.
Finally, we know that all tribes and tongues and nations will be present in heaven, worshiping God together and sharing in Christ’s inheritance. Revelation 7:9–10 says, “After this I looked, and there was a vast multitude from every nation, tribe, people, and language, which no one could number, standing before the throne and before the Lamb. They were clothed in white robes . . . And they cried out in a loud voice: Salvation belongs to our God, who is seated on the throne, and to the Lamb!” (CSB)
After considering the entire story of the Bible, it baffles me that the church has largely failed to address the sin of racism. If we know that our sin nature makes us prone to showing prejudice and partiality, why don’t we acknowledge the sin of racism and commit to fighting it just as intentionally as any other sin? And if we know that Christ is building His kingdom, crushing hostility, and bringing people together from around the world, why do we buy into the divisions and hostilities of our society?
As a counter-cultural institution, the church must lead the way in fighting the sin of racism and demonstrating the unity all people can have in Christ. The truth is simple. If we are to believe Scripture entirely, we must acknowledge that racism exists. If we are to obey Scripture faithfully, we must do something about it.
In light of these truths, I ask you to examine your own heart. Could it be that racism is closer than you realized? I am convinced that racism is a reality, in large part, because I see it in myself. I catch myself acting with fear when I am the only white person around. I find myself making subconscious assumptions about a person’s intelligence or integrity based on the color of his or her skin. I realize I am prone to avoiding rather than admiring people who are different from me. I hate that these things are true about me. I hate that five years after that conversation with my friend, I still have to combat these corrupt instincts. But Christ is changing me. He is teaching me to love all people as He does, and He is making the implications of the gospel for racial reconciliation ever more clear in my mind and heart.
To Each of You
I have said all that I can say, and I am ready to listen. Please give me the privilege of listening to you. Express your pain and suffering. Express your confusion and uncertainty. Express your hope that God is making all things new. All I ask is that you do two things for me: (1) call me out when I act in ignorance, fail to listen, or fail to love, and (2) give me specific ways to promote justice and serve my diverse community.
Thank you for listening to me.
A Theory on Christmas: Or the Evolutionary Nature of Sacred Things
from 02.10.19
I’ve been listening to this song lately. It’s sort of a haunting ode to the people we used to be as children and the things we’ve lost while growing. There’s a portion of the chorus that takes my breath away like a needle prick.
“Nothing lasts forever, hmm;
You can’t hold on, no.
Nothing lasts forever
So, what’s done is done.”
I stumbled across this song right before Christmas, and it lingered with me, pretending to be a carol. It was half-prophetic, half-fulfilled, almost like a real carol, and it met me in a moment when I was feeling increasingly estranged from the past and very vulnerable to the future. Perhaps this is the kind of song you remove from your playlist, especially around the holidays, but the closer Christmas came, the more I found myself drawn to it.
Christmas was complicated this year. Though it proved every bit as warm and delightful as it has always been, a heavy anticipation underscored the festivities like a somber baseline. The moments were charged with a fleeting quality, as though a voice was whispering, “This is the last time. It will never be this way again.”
I found myself trying to wrap my heart and my memory around each moment before it slipped away. I remember wondering, as I often have, how to best capture the time I want to keep—how to become a reservoir for everything that matters.
. . . . .
The afternoon my family arrived at my Granna and Pop-pop’s farmhouse, the sunlight was falling so beautifully through the windows, and the ambiance of Christmas overwhelmed my senses in a warm rush of comfort and nostalgia. Everything felt the way I remembered it, the way I always imagine it throughout the year.
Someone said, “This might be the last Weaver family Christmas in this house.” Suddenly, I was overwhelmed with fear that I would never see my grandparents’ home adorned for Christmas again. I grabbed my camera and began photographing every niche of the house—every warm corner and every bit of light that lingered throughout its rooms. After half an hour of frantically taking pictures, I gave into my frustration and put my camera away. There was no way to capture everything as it truly was. No way to distill a feeling into an image.
I was thoroughly disheartened that I could not preserve the intangible aspect of Christmas at my Granna and Pop-pop’s home. “How? How will I possibly be able to remember everything?” I wondered. This beleaguering question continued to baffle me over the rest of the holiday, and I became even more distressed when my mind wondered to all the priceless gifts I had simply allowed to slip into the past. It occurred to me that I had never truly noticed all the time and energy each of my grandparents sacrifice to make Christmas as magical as it is. That on so many occasions I had wondered off after dinner instead of staying to enjoy the company of cleaning up. I regretted that I had answered hundreds of questions about myself but rarely returned a question to the person who asked. And I realized almost fearfully that I hadn’t memorized the way loved ones look when they cry. I suddenly understood that for my whole life, I had been enjoying people and places and feelings, never aware that one day Time would test my memory of them all.
. . . . .
On New Year’s Day, my parents and my brothers left for their new life in South Africa. We stood at the terminal saying our goodbyes, and everything felt insufficient. We could only give so many hugs and say so many “I love you”s. Then they had to leave, and I had to walk back through an invisible veil and accept my own existence.
For almost two years, I had anticipated that day, but no amount of preparation made me ready. I had begun to let go of things slowly. First it personal belongings that had been saved for too many years. Then it was our house. Eventually, I moved out on my own. All of these farewells hurt in their own way, but the final relinquishing felt akin to something dying.
I had felt it coming even as the holidays blossomed into their full splendor. Christmas sustained a magical quality, as though it held all endings at bay, but it was the only bastion standing between me and those impossible goodbyes and once it was over, the world seemed harsher than it was before.
Loved ones said their farewells incrementally. First my Grandma and Grandpa and my Dad’s sister and her family. Then my mom’s sisters and their families. During the last few days of December, a steady stream of friends passed through the church’s small missions apartment, finding ways to prolong conversation, lingering as they hugged my parents, and crying as they departed. Finally, it was time for my sister and I to send them off.
It felt almost sacrilegious that they left on New Year’s Day. In my mind it had always been a holiday, a day reserved entirely for celebrating beginnings. But holidays are just arbitrary. New Year’s Day is also the day the credit card bill and rent check are due, and there is no rule that says seasons can’t end on January 1st. And so, while everyone else was sleeping off their New Year’s Eve celebrations, my Granna and Pop-pop drove us all to the airport, and we said our miserable goodbyes.
I had to return to Greenville as the holidays were over and work began again the next morning. Thankfully, several barriers to loneliness had been positioned throughout the rest of the day.
After we left Mom, Dad, Drew, and Grant at JFK, my Granna and Pop-pop took Carissa and me to breakfast. McDonald’s was the only place close to the airport that was open, but it was comforting to be together. My Granna and Pop-pop were as strong as ever, perhaps for our sake. Once we had finished breakfast, they drove me to Newark airport, where I cried again as I hugged my sister goodbye. The first barrier had fallen.
I spent several listless hours waiting for my flight, trying pointlessly to distract myself. Nothing on Netflix seemed remotely interesting, and writing proved nearly impossible. I bought pretzel nuggets from Auntie Anne’s and sat by a large window looking at the Manhattan skyline, which failed to inspire for the very first time. For a while I was consoled knowing my family was sitting only a few miles away at JFK. Finally, my mom texted and said they were boarding. The second barrier crumbled.
When I arrived in Greenville, it was dark. My Grandma and Grandpa picked me up at the airport, and we shared a quiet meal at Fuddruckers. After dinner, I stopped by their home to collect some left-behind presents and some fresh groceries they had bought for me. The vestiges of our extended family Christmas still lingered around the house. I wanted nothing more than to stay with my grandparents, but I needed to go back to my apartment and prepare for the workweek. “Honey, if you ever need anything—any time of the day or night—we are here,” my Grandma said. Starting to cry, I pulled out of their driveway and made my way across town. The final barrier collapsed. Sitting in the dark parking lot outside my building, I wept aloud like a child, more alone than I had ever been.
“One time I said goodbye to somebody
Who taught me how to tie my shoes.
If it was not for him I would not have been,
And my laces would still be loose”
. . . . .
As a child I learned life in absolutes. My mom and dad were always by my side. My family was always together at Christmas. Everyone belonged to a certain place. Discovering the world that way was beautiful because it taught me to trust, but at some point, change must confront this naïve understanding of reality.
In college I had a reckoning with change and decided to embrace it as an opportunity rather than a loss. (I think I had listened to someone romanticize new beginnings). I recognized that I was changing and that the world around me was constantly doing the same. However, I think I still believed sub-consciously that certain precious belongings were exempt from the law of the universe — that if they were important enough or loved enough, they were immutable. I was forced to admit this Christmas that I was wrong. Nothing is so sacred it cannot be asked to change.
“Nothing lasts forever.”
This little line followed me around all through the holidays and into the new year. I found myself repeating it over and over to myself as though it simplified everything I was feeling.
The melancholy notes flooded my mind when my dad hugged my aunt goodbye. It was one of those moments I consciously remembered they are siblings and have a whole lifetime of memories together — memories that were being abruptly interrupted.
I heard these words when I realized I was likely enjoying the last Christmas in my Granna and Pop-pop’s beloved home. They looped through my mind as I helped my dad finish packing up his office. I asked if he was sad to leave it, and he said, “Yeah, I’ve spent a long time here. I’m trying not to think too much about it.”
The song echoed over and over as I sat trying to write letters to my parents and my brothers before they left. It surrounded me that horrible night I hid in my car crying. I hear it often when my mom’s voice comes to mind: “Everything has its seasons, and that’s okay.”
. . . . .
I’m still wondering how to capture time. Wondering if it’s possible to counteract the force of change. I haven’t decided if it’s best to record my life—to document the days and catalog the feelings until I have a personal museum—or if it’s better to partake of every moment—to guzzle every drop out of fear that it won’t be conjured again. Both seem inadequate somehow. Trying to hold everything in my memory against the threat of change or forgetfulness is like trying to keep the ocean from carving away the sand. It is a burden no one should take upon himself. Our moments are not relics; they are gifts. And feeling obligated to perfectly preserve every one steals just as much joy as taking them for granted. Perhaps all we’re meant to do is accept the blessing.
Simply experiencing life’s gifts without trying to immortalize them goes against every instinct I have to protect what I love. And the hard truth is that I very well may lose things I treasure. Throughout life, there will be many days when even the things I hold most dear will begin to change. Nothing I can do or say makes that fact any easier. But I’m learning to accept it and to believe that every phase of life’s evolution can be just as beautiful as the last. My family separated is capable of just as much love as my family together. Our next Christmas will be just as special whether it is in the same house or not. The moments that have fallen from remembrance will leave room for new memories to be born. The things that we mourn now will not be able to diminish our joy tomorrow.
“Nothing lasts forever;
You can’t hold on, no.
Nothing lasts forever
So, what’s done is done.
First you die (die, feel), then you feel.
Then you cry (cry, heal), then you heal.”
Listen to the Shadows: Seizing a Moment of Darkness to Realize a Brighter Future
from 04.10.2018
In recent months we have been confronted with the pervasiveness of a disease that we have allowed to propagate for centuries, silently metastasizing in the minds of our most beloved artists, poisoning the hands of our most revered leaders, and infecting the souls of those we believed we knew best. For many, this epidemic has never been a secret—they have watched it spread daily, encroaching upon their safety, their agency, and their identity. For others, ignorant of this contagion or immune to its consequences, this year’s headlines have come as a shock. Still others, sick themselves, are unable to see the devastation for what it is—the shadow cast by an empire of abuse.
For generations, this immoral and discriminatory system has been incontestable. Powerful individuals have simply side-stepped serious allegations brought against them, and victims of abuse have been ignored or silenced. Last November, when the American people elected a President known to be a sexual predator, it seemed injustice was to be overlooked for good. Abuse had become normalized, even excusable. However, scores of brave individuals have chosen this unlikely moment to share their stories of abuse, exposing rampant corruption and inciting a moment long overdue, in which we must confront evil or allow our children to become its next victims—or worse, its perpetrators.
Addressing the subject of abuse is daunting because so many people have suffered abuse in their lifetime and it is impossible to represent the complexity and nuance of everyone’s experience. To complicate the matter, our society has a variety of misconceptions about the nature of abuse (e.g., who really bears the responsibility and what constitutes an appropriate response). Moreover, abuse is symptomatic of a deeper cultural issue, a destructive manner of thinking, which, along with its many other manifestations, is rarely addressed. Finally, most discussions of abuse conclude without any real solutions being offered. But we are obligated, despite these challenges, to address this issue with empathy and determination because our sisters and our brothers are pleading for change, for justice, for honor.
I will not pretend that I can understand all the complexities of this issue; nor will I attempt to speak for those who have experienced sexual abuse or harassment because I never have. I am a young white man, privileged by virtue of my sex and ethnicity and generally sheltered from many of life’s harsher realities. I refuse to dishonor those who have suffered by acting as though I can relate or thoroughly comprehend their pain. However, I fear for those in my life who have less privilege and power than I have, and I fear because I know how it feels for a man to profane my body with his hands and disparage my person-hood with his words.
As a defenseless nine-year-old, I placed my faith in a man, an authority figure responsible for my well-being, who did not have my best interests in mind. He was our family dentist, a Christian man respected by my parents and by many others in our community. I especially admired him because I knew he gave my family free dental care—a blessing for a low-income family with no dental insurance. Sitting in the patient’s chair preparing to have a cavity filled, I made a simple request: “I’m claustrophobic. Can I please have some breathers every once-in-a-while?” My dentist agreed and went to work. Lying back in the chair with his drill showering grit everywhere and his spray tool shooting a stream of water down my throat, I felt like I was drowning. I raised my hand to alert him that I needed a break. Instead of allowing me to sit forward and swallow the grainy water rising in my esophagus, he told me to put my hand down and breathe through my nose. Panicked, I pulled his smothering hand and his cold instruments out of my mouth and sat upright in the chair. What ensued was a display of aggression I will never forget. He clapped his hand over my mouth, pushed me down into the chair, and repeated his stern command to breathe through my nose. Scared and betrayed, I tried to sit forward again, but his hand was like a wall built on top of me, holding me under the water. I began kicking desperately and screaming wildly for help. He fastened his enormous hands around my arms and used all the strength in his large pound body to wrestle me back into the chair. Hopelessly overpowered and convinced I was going to die, I lost control of my bladder and drenched my jeans in urine.
By the time my mother made her way back to my stall from the waiting room, I had managed to writhe my way out of the chair, but the dentist had his hand clamped to my jaw, shaking me violently and yelling accusations in my face. My mom ordered him to stop, but he wouldn’t release me. He kept threatening to carry me to his office and “finish it.” I truly believed I would not leave the building alive. My mother had to remove his hands from my body because he wouldn’t let go. When she confronted him about his actions, he began blaming me, calling me a “disobedient boy” who “doesn’t listen.” Though my mother protested, arguing that I was a submissive child, he said, “we’ll have to agree to disagree.” Finally, my mom marched me and my siblings out of the office, tears running down her cheeks and a grown man’s handprint impressed on my face.
As a result of the trauma, I developed severe OCD and a debilitating eating disorder and spent the next three years drifting from institution to institution being treated by the world’s finest doctors, none of whom could treat the real issue—a lingering sense of fear and insecurity. I was changed forever.
It is not my intention to equivocate my experience with the experience of sexual abuse victims. Nonetheless, my encounter with my dentist serves as my interpretive framework because the tactics of abuse are always the same—use your power or reputation to establish a mirage of trustworthiness; choose a victim who is vulnerable and less powerful; and when confronted, place the responsibility on your victim to protect yourself.
For those who have never experienced abuse, it may seem that I am exaggerating or crafting an argument designed to vilify those who misuse their power. The abuse process I have described may seem too calculated and heinous to be believable. Allow me to say as graciously as possible that if you have never been abused, preyed upon, or exploited, then you cannot understand. I am not suggesting that all abuse is premeditated or that a perpetrator’s entire life is always devoted to ensnaring his victims. I do not believe that my dentist provided my family with free dental care to deceive us. However, the abusive behavior he demonstrated that day was not an isolated incident—he knew what he was capable of. He offered free service to poorer customers and had Bible verses painted on the ceiling tiles in his office to establish a persona that wasn’t entirely accurate. I do not believe he began his work day with intent to harm someone or that he chose me through some kind of selection process to be his victim. Rather, I think his behavior was an inappropriate response to frustration and pent-up anger. However, he treated me the way he did because he was able to, because there was nothing I could do about it. I strongly doubt he would have acted so aggressively toward an adult male patient. I also doubt that he believed I was disobedient—he could see that I was acting out of fear. He needed to accuse me of disrespect and defiance to shift the responsibility for his actions. If I was misbehaving and he was simply enforcing discipline, then I was to blame. Suddenly, I am not the victim but the instigator. That’s how abuse works.
I need to reiterate that I am using my story to illustrate a concept, not to represent everyone’s experience. I truly believe that my dentist is a well-intentioned man who has made some devastating mistakes. However, many people suffer at the hands of truly evil men, men who are predators, men who have developed entire networks of deception and manipulation. Abuse is villainous, and instead of debating it because it sounds too bad to be true or pardoning it because someone has an excuse, we must call it what it is and commit to eradicating it.
Earlier, I referred to abuse as a “sickness” and a “disease.” I use these terms cautiously because they could be used to excuse predators or rationalize abusive behavior. Offenders are not ill or infected in the sense that they lose control over their thoughts or actions—abuse is always volitional and always criminal. I chose to use the language of impoverished health because sickness is a corruption of what is normal and right—a corruption so thorough that it erases memory of what is natural and becomes normalized itself. This has happened in our society. We have succumbed to a mindset that makes us comfortable with treating women unfairly, tolerating abuse, and blaming victims. This mindset is like a virus that has hijacked our conscious, replacing logic and morals with senselessness and complacency. This kind of thinking has given predators license to exploit their victims, and it has made the rest of us complicit in abuse. We are sick, not because we cannot think for ourselves, but because we have forgotten how to think correctly. In order to heal as a society, we must combat our diseased thinking without using it as an excuse for criminal behavior.
So what is this toxic mindset that has overtaken our culture? What are the lies and assumptions that we must dismantle to be healthy again? What broken philosophy prevents us from upholding the honor and sanctity of every individual? As I said before, fighting abuse is complicated by the fact that so many people misunderstand it. One of the most troubling misconceptions is the idea that victims somehow carry responsibility for their abuse. It seems that every time a woman in particular reports having experienced harassment or assault, people’s first instinct is to ask what she was wearing or if she was drunk, as if her clothing or alcohol consumption give an assailant permission to exploit her. I understand the need to uncover any behavior that could have been misinterpreted as consent, but these are poor questions because they address a victim’s condition independent of her abuser rather than her interaction with him. A better question would be: “Could any of your actions have been misunderstood?” Instead of supposing that a women’s attire or alcohol consumption precipitate her abuse, this question supposes that any misjudgment could only have come from a personal interaction with an alleged abuser. This question also gives the victim the opportunity to defend her behavior, whereas the other questions require that she give a one-word answer and remain at the mercy of the jury. It may seem that I am splitting hairs, but the questions we ask carry significance—they can give victims power or take it away.
Asking bad questions, combined with the cultural tendency to challenge the victim’s testimony first, heaps shame upon these brave individuals by calling their integrity into question when all they are seeking is justice. These demeaning responses reveal that we are predisposed to blame victims, especially female victims. This must end. It is time for our society and our justice system to accept a governing truth: abuse is never the victim’s fault. Men are always obligated to treat women with dignity and respect, regardless of a woman’s condition. Those in power always have the responsibility to treat the powerless with honor and equity, regardless of race, gender, sexual orientation, or personal convictions. Moreover, when powerful, privileged individuals fail to meet this obligation, the fault rests entirely upon them. No one has ever asked me if perhaps I behaved a little irrationally or disrespectfully in the dentist office that day. No one has ever dared to suggest that I am responsible for my abuse because I didn’t obey the instructions I was given. It would be unthinkable to blame a nine-year-old child for the abusive actions of an older man. Why is it not equally intolerable to blame women, or any victim, for their abuse?
Before moving on, allow me to clarify my argument. I think it is necessary to acknowledge that everyone is responsible for the way they choose to present themselves. We must also recognize that the way in which we choose to present ourselves communicates a message about how we want to be perceived. Any person who uses social media knows this. We curate images and aesthetics to present a certain image to the world because we are extremely conscious of how we want to be viewed. We understand that we are able to influence the way other people think about us. This awareness affects how we choose to dress and how we choose to behave. We may speak in a casual manner and maintain a relaxed posture in order to appear relatable or approachable. We may choose to wear expensive clothing to display wealth. We may choose to dress provocatively to be seen as hot or sexy. (Allow me to clarify even further and say that wanting people to think you’re sexy is not the same as wanting to be objectified. No one ever wants to be exploited, regardless of how he or she is dressed. If you misinterpret someone’s appearance as an invitation for unsolicited sexual contact, then the fault lies with you.) No matter how we wish to look or behave, we are responsible for the image we choose to present. As a Christian, I believe the Bible instructs women to dress and behave modestly, a principle that applies to men as well. I also believe the Bible charges men to treat women with honor and respect. These two commands are not contingent upon one another. This means that God expects men to esteem women regardless of how they present themselves. God does not tolerate abuse under any circumstances. What I am trying to illustrate is that our personal responsibility to present ourselves appropriately does not diminish or negate another person’s responsibility to treat us with respect. No matter how people choose to behave, they deserve basic human respect.
Another harmful misconception is the notion that consent always means willfulness. Often, victims choose to participate in unwanted sexual activity because they are made to feel they have no other choice. This happens when corrupt men manipulate weaker individuals into giving away their bodies by threatening their safety, their career, their reputation, or anything else of value they may possess. This can also happen when a leader chooses to withhold something someone has worked for, such as a raise, a promotion, or an opportunity. In these instances, victims are pressured to trade their dignity and innocence in order to preserve themselves. This is abuse. Choosing to comply with abusive demands because you are given no other option does not count as consent, and it does not make a victim complicit in their abuse. New York Times best-selling author Ann Voskamp writes, “Consent isn’t so much about an equal sense of permission as consent depends on the equal distribution of power—or there’s [an] intolerable violation of rights.” If people are not given the power or the permission to say ‘no,’ then they have been stripped of their human rights and are just as worthy of justice as those who choose to resist. Sadly, our culture has chosen to belittle these individuals and abandon their cause. Our courts have allowed sexual predators to walk free simply because they coerced their victims into giving verbal consent. This is not justice — true justice is given to all who are oppressed, whether they are able to fight their abuse or not.
A final misconception I must address is the belief that a delayed report or accusation lacks validity. As stories of abuse and harassment began surfacing early last fall, implicating some of the most powerful men in our society, many of the individuals making these allegations where challenged as to why they had waited so long to report their abuse. A simple awareness of abuse statistics would have squelched this unfair inquiry. According to the Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network (RAINN), there are many reasons victims remain silent, including fear of retaliation, the belief that the police will not or cannot help, and the feeling that their experience is not important enough to report. Additionally, our justice system has disincentivized reporting sexual abuse because it has failed to punish predators. Only 6 out of every 1000 rapists will be incarcerated (RAINN). This is partially due to the fact that most sexual violence goes unreported—out of 1000 rapes, it is estimated that only 310 are reported. However, out of these 310 reports, only 57 lead to arrest. Only 11 of the perpetrators will be taken to trial, and only 7 will be convicted. This means that only about 2% of accused rapists will be imprisoned (RAINN). Victims are not motivated to report their abuse and face public humiliation when they are not guaranteed justice. The brave individuals who have recently shared their stories of abuse have done so in spite of great opposition and often after years of being silenced. Rather than being interrogated, they should be applauded for their courage and supported as they pursue the redress they deserve.
In addition to correcting these gross misconceptions, I must address the fundamental flaw in our cultural mindset that allows abuse to spread unchecked. Quite simply, we lack respect for human life. At the heart of all abuse is the failure of an aggressor to acknowledge the individual worth of another human being. However, offenders inherit their defective value system from a society that consistently undermines the worth of its citizens, particularly its female citizens. This happens in a variety of ways. Pornography and misogynistic entertainment reduce women to sexual objects as a means of satisfying the lustful fantasies of unconscionable audiences. Pay inequality undermines the capability of women and the contributions they make to society. Unequal representation deprives women of opportunity and discourages a young generation of girls who aspire to a brighter future. Unenforced laws and conduct policies fail to protect women and instead communicate that their well-being is unimportant. Furthermore, these cultural norms teach men and boys how to treat women with disrespect. Because boys are able to consume an unlimited amount of pornography online, they learn to use women to fulfill their sexual desires. Because women are unfairly compensated, men learn that they can extort the labor and creative energy of their female colleagues. Because women are significantly under-represented in most professions, men learn to neglect female perspectives and pass over women looking for greater opportunities in the workforce. Because there are no consequences for inappropriate behavior, men learn that they may treat women however they like without personal loss. Ultimately, these social trends lead to abuse because they communicate to the male population that women are of lesser value. This destructive mindset is the root of our culture of abuse, and nothing will change until we reorient our thinking.
Once we have identified and corrected our flawed cultural mindset, we must develop and enact solutions that will create change. Until recently, most conversations regarding sexual abuse have resulted in little action. If we are ever to live in a safer, more wholesome world, we must begin remaking our society. As I said earlier, I do not claim to understand our culture of abuse perfectly. I am no expert in legal reform or social advocacy. However, I believe there are simple steps that can be taken to begin healing our diseased culture. Organizations like Time’s Up and Lean In are making an enormous impact by developing strategies to combat harassment and abuse, providing resources to empower women, and educating the public about social equality. To find out more about what these organizations are doing, look here and here.
Most importantly, we can create change by raising our children responsibly. Parents can end the generational cycle of abuse and inequality by teaching their children to respect all people. Instead of using misogynistic language and teaching sexual prowess, fathers must show their sons how to honor women with their words and their behavior. Instead of establishing a male-female hierarchy of value in the home, fathers and mothers must demonstrate how to work in unison by respecting everyone’s contribution and perspective. Instead of surrounding their children with other kids of the same ethnicity/culture/class, parents must foster a love for all people by encouraging their children to interact with a diverse group of peers. By instilling these important values at home, parents can begin dismantling our abusive empire.
Finally, we must bolster one another’s courage and cling to the promise of hope. Hope for a brighter future does exist—we have reached the critical moment, and there is no turning back. The possibility of personal healing is even more real. After enduring my own abuse and the ensuing health crises, I finally found the hope and security I was desperately seeking. I discovered that I could live at peace by casting my fears on God and surrendering my need for control. I realized that I did not have to be defined by my abuse or by my illness. I learned I could live with confidence because Jesus has secured my worth by dying for me and no person can ever diminish my value. The Bible says in II Corinthians 5:17, “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come.”
I am no longer chained to the past. I do not lie awake in the nighttime shadows tortured by the demons of abuse. I sleep sweetly, dreaming of the bright, promising future, where we will all awake standing side by side, the flowering ruins of a toppled empire beneath our feet.
Broken, Open: How I Was Disabused of My Christmas Fantasy and Awakened to the World Around Me
from 12.22.16
To my severe frustration and the demise of my child-like expectancy, I have not been able to catch the Christmas spirit this December. This isn’t the admission of an overly-stressed, unfulfilled Hallmark character who simply needs a little holiday cheer and a cup of hot chocolate to reexperience the magic of the season. This isn’t even the confession of a maturing adult disillusioned by the sentimentality and consumerism of Christmas. I am neither of these people. This is simply the tearful honesty of someone overwhelmed by the brokenness of the world and struggling to reconcile his pain with a God who is said to be near.
Christmas has always been my favorite season. I cannot remember a single year the lights, decorations, and music have not reawakened my wonder. Everything about the holiday usually holds me spell-bound. Every December my world is transformed into a magical, Dickensian setting full of pine, cut-out cookies, and nostalgia. I promise this is not a dramatization. Truly, Christmas has always been sacred to me, like experiencing the impossible. Like living in an entirely different world.
My obsession with Christmas can only be credited to my upbringing. My family takes Christmas very seriously. Careful consideration is given to each decorating decision, each candle scent, each holiday menu, and each festive outfit. Every member of the family has a favorite ornament, a favorite food, or a favorite carol. This ensures our Christmas celebrations never simplify. As well, there are certain traditions that have become family rule by now. Christmas music is is not to be played till the day after Thanksgiving, and when it is played, the first song must be “Mary’s Little Boy Child” by Jim Reeves. Real trees are, of course, the standard (pine-scented candles are insufficient), and movie theaters are off-limits on Christmas day (but there is always Hallmark Channel). The Christmas story is always read, and stockings are always opened first. It is always chaotic, caffeinated, and cozy.
And it was always untouchable—the inside of a snow globe.
Talking.
Laughter.
Lights.
Music.
Brightness.
Heartbeat.
. . . . .
After a wonderful Thanksgiving with my aunt and uncle, my grandparents were driving me back to school on their way home to PA. We left my aunt and uncle’s home early while it was still dark and Lilburn, Georgia, was still asleep. In the back seat, huddled next to piles of luggage and curled under a fleece blanket, I closed my eyes and listened while Jim Reeves, Julie Andrews, and Chet Atkins sang to the dark and sleepy world. My grandfather soon pulled up to a Starbucks and ran inside to order something warm. There was a man standing outside, but I don’t remember noticing anything special about him before I closed my eyes again. Trying to remember him now, I see him shivering in his coat and pressing into a brick column for any warmth he could find. As my grandfather came out of the store, the man approached him. I couldn’t hear what he said, but I watched my Pop-pop open his wallet and hand him a few bills. I think they shook hands, and that was it. My grandfather was back in the car, and we were on the road again. We didn’t talk much about it, except my Pop-pop said that’s what Jesus would have done.
I wonder if that man saw me watching him from the car.
I wonder what he thought of my world.
I stopped talking.
. . . . .
Paris, Belgium, Orlando. Mali, Syria, San Bernardino.
The flag hangs in the middle of campus by the old bell. I kept walking past it, trying to remember the last time it had flown at the top of the pole, but I couldn’t recall that golden day. It seemed like every week I woke up to more tragedy. No one had time to heal. The wound in our humanity hung perpetually open. Paris, Mali, and California were attacked right before Christmas. People drew circles around the Eiffel Tower and prayed for peace like hate would just cease for the holidays. I remember trying to decide how to celebrate Christmas last year amidst the devastation. I think I wrote about the events and then pushed them aside. I did the same after the Pulse nightclub shooting. I think I wrote some true ideas. But those journals are dusty now. Looking back over them, they seem insufficient.
Journal entry from December 3, 2015: The sky was bruised. The air was sharp. They told me bombs exploded in Paris last week. That people died in Mali. And that more people were killed in California. Suddenly, the trees struck me as notes, the wires as a staff, and the telephone poles bars. The whole world seemed to devolve into a wild and despairing song. It spun and plunged and darkened and deepened and everything disappeared. I remember dreaming about peace on earth. And somewhere there were bells, and they grew louder and louder and louder. They seemed to say a name. A strangely familiar name, one I must have heard long ago. I woke up and everything was silent. Then I heard it, echoed on the wind: Emmanuel.
I think, looking back, the entire world feels the insufficiency of the ways it tried to cope, the ways it tried to heal, the ways it tried to move on. Everywhere I look on the internet, everyone seems to agree (if on nothing else) that 2016 has been the worst year in recent history. I certainly can’t object to that idea. I think it has changed everyone. Not that people have stopped fighting or crying or shouting. But I think everyone is unsure, tense. The year hasn’t exactly prepared us for Christmas. The stores still want a profit though, so cheers, I guess.
The laughter faded.
. . . . .
It was after Michael Brown, Walter Scott, Alton Sterling, and Keith Scott that I finally admitted maybe institutional racism is still real. That maybe it still harms millions of people. That maybe I was ignorant. It was October when the streets became violent and people were crying and no one could really tell me the truth. What really happened, and what is it really like to not be white in America? I sat slouching over my computer in frustration, reading every news source, watching video footage, skimming social media, trying and failing to understand. Finally, after searching for answers from white individuals hypothesizing about racism, I thought to ask a black man for the truth. After years of pretending I could understand the minority experience, I realized that I couldn’t possibly. I remember I was so afraid to ask my friend how he felt. I remember he wanted to tell me. I remember the truth hurts.
I cannot describe how painful it was to look into his eyes while he told me that he and I will never be seen the same. That my skin earns me opportunity, privilege, and security he will never have. That my experience is a novelty. That my life is a falsehood.
I was stunned, sobered, quieted.
The lights flickered.
. . . . .
I was supposed to be writing a final paper about Shakespeare’s progressivism. I knew what I wanted to say, but I was struggling to find research to support my argument. I was frustrated and unmotivated. I was scrolling through Facebook (or procrastinating, whatever), and I came to a hole—a giant whole in my knowledge, my comfort, and my self-preoccupation. It was Aleppo. Please tell me you know what I’m talking about because I was completely unaware. And my biggest question upon reading the story was how can my experience and their experience coexist? How can I be sitting here working on a stupid Shakespeare paper while these people are fleeing, starving, dying?
I remember being angry because no one else was talking about it. There is still no one talking about it. Why haven’t I heard Aleppo whispered on the prayerful lips of people at church? Why haven’t I read about Christians making sacrifices to help these people? I hear everyone talking about frenzied holiday shopping and travel plans. I hear everyone wishing each other a merry Christmas and happy New Year. I hear my favorite carols played over and over on the radio. And its all ringing hollow this year. Like maybe there’s no depth to it. Like maybe my magical world is fake.
The music stopped.
. . . . .
I hold on to things. Like old birthday cards and broken cell phones and half-buried doubts. Because they’re important or because they hold memories or because they might still be half-alive. I’ve held onto these recent moments because they came crashing into my life and lodged somewhere deep. These events have altered my world irreversibly.
I’ve held onto many other things that I haven’t told you about. Painful words. Hurtful expectations. Perfectionism. I hold onto my self-crafted identity because I need it. I hold onto love even though it can’t be realized. I hold onto insecurities because they might make me better.
I let things haunt me.
I let them all shift around inside. I let them sink and reemerge as they please. Withering and burgeoning. Settling and storming. But I guess I’ve always been able to suppress them when I needed to. Especially at Christmas. But this year is different. The world is different.
Darkness.
. . . . .
The magic was lost so easily. The security and immunity of Christmas—I can’t find it like I always have. The breaking of my world cannot be undone. The glass dome of the snow globe is gaping. The little church stands dimmed, and a haunting tune echoes inside: “Peace on earth.” But I’m sitting outside on the cold steps amidst the snow and shards, staring up at the shattered ceiling and what lies beyond, wondering “WHY?”
Pulse. Breath. Beat. . . Beat . . . Beat . . . . . . . . . .
Stop.
. . . . . . . . . . Beat . . . Beat . . . Beat.
Gazing up through the broken glass atmosphere of my once-idyllic world, I begin to realize the enormity of the outside. I realize that I cannot see the end of it. There are so many people. They’re all different; they’re all hurting.
And I can get to them.
My world has not just been broken—it has been opened, enlarged.
. . . . .
Brightness.
I asked “why?” so many times this year. When the man at Starbucks stood freezing. When the terror attacks and hate crimes took place. When my friend told me about his world. When I saw the people of Aleppo crying. I asked why God allows it all. I asked—I am asking—how to celebrate God coming to earth when He seems completely absent. Can the reality of Christmas be reconciled with the reality of our brokenness?
. . . . .
I hear music again.
In June, after the Pulse nightclub shooting, I began writing these questions. I wrote, trying to process the tragedy, trying to understand why, trying to answer my questions. I finally concluded that God’s presence was better than receiving answers. In that moment, I thought I understood Christmas. Maybe I did partially.
I realized that God’s answer to Israel’s questions was Emmanuel. I realized that God’s presence with us eliminates the need for answers. I wrote, “O come, O come, Emmanuel.” I thought that was the end to my questions.
. . . . .
Lights begin to glow.
What I wrote in June was true. I know it is. I know God is with us. But I’m really struggling to believe it. I’m struggling to find peace. Why can I not believe something now I was so convinced of then? I think God is giving me the answer by showing me the suffering of the world. By allowing it to penetrate my world. He has given us his presence, what the Bible calls an “indescribable gift.” But how can we believe that God is here, how can we be reminded that he is working, if we are not living in response to his gift. I expected to experience complete peace and satisfaction by believing in God’s presence without doing anything with it. But my Pop-pop is right. Jesus would have helped that man. He would have sat with the oppressed and comforted the homeless. And he expects us to do the same.
. . . . .
I hear laughter.
I guess what I’m coming to is this: presence matters. God has given us his presence, and in turn, we must give our presence to others. We cannot be aware of God’s involvement in the world while we remain at home. We inevitably become overwhelmed by tragic headlines and personal disappointment, fearing that God has withdrawn. It is when we offer to others what God has given to us that we experience him work. When we give love and presence to others, God proves that he is redeeming everything. This is the full meaning of Christmas: God has drawn near to us so we draw near to others. This is when we can celebrate. Because Christmas is not us sitting around a tree trying to drum up holiday cheer amidst tragedy. Christmas is us being involved with those who are suffering because we know God is here. We do not sit watching the violence of the world, hoping God will establish peace. We run to the darkness believing we are God’s instruments of peace.
. . . . .
I am ready to speak.
I am compelled by my new understanding of Christmas. Compelled to act. Compelled to awaken others to action.
I wish I could drop everything and go help people escape Aleppo. I wish I could withdraw from college and advocate for minority rights. I wish I could open a soup kitchen for the homeless. I wish I could be physically present with everyone. Unfortunately, I am limited. We all are. However, I have found simple ways to confront injustice and provide for the suffering. Have a conversation with someone who has experienced racism. Ask your friends and neighbors what the world is like for them. Seek to understand. Sponsor a refugee family or become involved with your local refugee ministry. I did, and it was life-changing. Learn how to further help refugees here. Donate to provide necessities for people suffering in Aleppo here or here. Be present for these people by making simple sacrifices.
God completely disrupted my life this year. He allowed the security of my life and the sublimity of my favorite season to be broken. It has been a painful year full of heartbreak and disappointment. However, God did not simply shatter my world or my Christmas experience—he enlarged it. He made me see that Christmas, and all of life, is about dwelling in his presence and sharing it with others.
The hollowed shell of my old world looks dark and empty. It looks unreal. The rest of the world looks just as devastating, but I see it filled with God’s presence. Filled with his children multiplying his presence to the edges of the earth.
Heartbeat.
Brightness.
Music.
Lights.
Laughter.
Talking.
Emmanuel.