A Poem for Good Friday

Thorn

The Thorn in my side is particularly sharp today

It pricks and twists and goads and grieves

my body and my heart

It carves into my mind

and cannot be excised

Oh, that I were a mollusk

A strange thing to wish, I know,

but then I could blunt the sharpness of my Thorn

with coats of nacre

and make something beautiful out of the pain

I am not a mollusk (alas),

but I have words for nacre

and I will layer them

and layer them

and layer them

until I make something beautiful

until I reflect the One who took

my crown of thorns

to give me a crown of glory.

(EET - 01/10/2022)

Epiphany: Anger, Idolatry, and Storming the Capitol

Note: I wrote most of this on Thursday, 1/7/21, but chose to wait until Sunday, 1/10/21, to actually post it because I wanted to sleep on it, edit it, and make sure I wasn't just being reactionary.

On Wednesday, I didn’t write anything or post anything, because I knew it would come out harsh and aggressive.  I was—and am still—angry.  I am overflowing with what I’d consider ‘righteous indignation.’  But I also don't want to add to the problems or worsen the rifts that cracked open Wednesday along fault lines that have been forming for years—decades, even—beneath the ground of the political landscape.  The fault lines run deep, cutting through the hearts and minds and relationships and core beliefs of people across every state in our country, and indeed everywhere around the world.

There is so much anger—and I believe much of it stems from fear and from hurt.  There is so much fear.  Anger is the secondary emotion, the reaction to the underlying ones.  There’s a lack of communication and understanding and humane compassion.  We fail to listen to one another.  We look at the faces of family and friends, and we see enemies instead.  We look at people we don’t know—anyone with a public platform who thinks differently from us—and we see someone who wants to burn the system down and take away the things we hold most dear.  We fail to see that they, too, are afraid.  They, too, believe we are at a crossroads, an existential crisis where the principles and rights of a free society are in grave danger.  People on both sides of the aisle fervently embrace the ethos of one of the UK’s motivational propaganda posters from WWII: ‘Freedom Is In Peril - Defend It With All Your Might.’

That’s one of the things I’ve discovered over the past decade as I’ve gone through what I once described to Drew as “a bad breakup with the religious right.”  Stepping outside of that bubble into a state of political homelessness¹ has helped me to see something that shouldn’t have surprised me but which honestly did, to my shame: that many liberals who I’d previously been led to believe would have no respect for the U.S. Constitution and who would throw it aside in the name of progress were actually just as defensive of the principles of freedom and dignity that it contains as many of the originalists I’d grown up around.  Yes, people on both sides of the aisle are flawed human beings who often exhibit hypocritical, judgmental, and selfish behavior regarding one or more issues. Yes, there are people at both fringes who by default and without provocation want to burn the system down in favor of either anarchy or totalitarianism of one form or another, but I believe those people are absolutely the minority.  The reality is that vast numbers of people on both sides of the aisle want to hold personal religious or moral beliefs without government persecution.  On both sides of the aisle, we don’t want to be disenfranchised because of our racial or ethnic background, our gender, or our socioeconomic status.  We don’t want to be unfairly excluded from the economy or systemically silenced in the marketplace of ideas (keyword: systemic; I’m relegating the particulars of 1st amendment discussions to another conversation).  On both sides of the aisle, we want our kids to grow up in a free society that truly acknowledges the inherent dignity and equality of all human beings, no matter who they are, no matter what societal categories they belong to.  Across large swaths of the political spectrum, we value the natural rights to life and liberty and advocate for those rights in a heterophonic refrain.  When we think these natural rights are at risk, we get scared.  When these rights get legitimately threatened, whether in large or small ways, there is genuine hurt.  And out of that hurt and that fear, we get defensive.  We get angry.

But being angry and being violent are two vastly different things.

What happened at the U.S. Capitol on Wednesday should not have happened.  I unequivocally condemn the violence, and I condemn even more harshly those political leaders who instigated it, who capitalized on the hurts and fears and insufficient Constitutional literacy of millions of Americans for their own gain (in particular: President Trump, Sen. Hawley, Sen. Cruz, and other elected officials who were complicit in the lies and pageantry for months, and even now are unwilling to distance themselves from that rhetoric).  Most importantly, I condemn in the strongest possible terms the people who link and equate the Gospel of Jesus Christ with the views that culminated in Wednesday’s literal assault on the physical seat of elected representative government in the United States.

Trump Supporters Gather Outside the Capitol, Wednesday, Jan. 6, 2021, in Washington. (AP Photo/John Minchillo)² The AP photojournalist who took this photo was attacked³ by members of the crowd and had to be escorted to safety. Other members of the press suffered similar attacks⁴.

That coupling is a heresy⁵, and it is a stumbling block to people both inside and outside the church. If we embrace that heresy, then we have failed in our most fundamental callings as Christians: we have not loved our neighbors, nor acted justly, nor loved mercy, nor walked humbly with our God (Romans 13:9-10⁶; Micah 6:8⁷). If we embrace that heresy, we break the first three of the ten commandments simultaneously: we place an idealized image of America on a pedestal next to God, thereby making an idol of it and misusing His Name for our own gain.  Those who participated in Wednesday’s assault took that even further, arguably adding commandments six, eight, nine, and ten to the list of the day’s offenses: they acted on hatred for others, destroyed or stole what was not theirs to take (it is the people’s house, yes, but it belongs to all Americans, not just to the ones who share the beliefs of those who stormed the rotunda, defaced government property, and threatened to lynch elected officials), and they repeated lies and slander without remorse, coveting a powerful office for their political tribe which all evidence proves they did not have a legal, electoral right to claim.

This heresy has sunk its insidious roots deep into the flesh of the American church like a cancer, growing and metastasizing at an alarming rate.  Excising that cancer will be deeply painful, but it is necessary in order for the American church to heal.  It is necessary. Unlike the WWII poster’s assertion, ultimately the Gospel itself is not in peril; God is faithful and, out of His mercy, He always preserves a remnant, both here and around the world.  But what is at stake is the collateral damage—the real harm being done to the souls of Christians and non-Christians alike when the actions of those of us who profess Christ are at odds with the words and actions of the Christ we profess.  We are hurting others.  We are hurting ourselves.  It has to stop.  It has to stop now.  The complete extirpation of that heresy must begin today.  As our country repairs the literal and philosophical damage on Capitol Hill, the church must repair the damage within, too.

But violence must not beget violence, and hatred must not be answered with hatred.

The enemy is not my neighbor.  The enemy is not my family or my friends.  The enemy doesn’t sit on the other side of a political aisle or on a pew in a different denomination.  The real enemy is fear.  The real enemy is hatred.  The real enemy is dangerous ideology.  Ideas are powerful, and words have consequences.  We see that only too clearly today as we survey the physical and metaphysical damage in the cold light of dawn.

As we face a reckoning in the American church, I am hoping and praying that we will all return to the foot of the cross together, humbly confessing like the prodigal son and humbling granting forgiveness like the prodigal’s father. (This is the analogy set forth in David French's Nov. 2020 article⁸ on the subject, which I have found to be particularly moving and convicting over the past two months; I highly recommend it.)  May we, unlike the prodigal’s older brother, have the humility to forgive our repenting brothers and sisters as Christ has forgiven us our sins, which may be less public but are no less real and no less of an affront to the holiness of God.

As we face a reckoning in our society, I am hoping and praying that we can all rise above our differences and work together as Americans to reaffirm the fundamental rights and governing principles of our democratic republic, because despite all the vitriol, there’s still more that unites than divides us, and violence isn’t the way to heal the rifts.

The way forward, both in the church and in our society, is through listening well and speaking the truth in love.  May all American Christians heed the calling to act justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with our God.  May all Americans—regardless of religious beliefs or political alignments—learn how to love our neighbors as ourselves.

Links:

¹ French, David. “The Spiritual Blessing of Political Homelessness.” The French Press, The Dispatch, 18 Oct. 2020, frenchpress.thedispatch.com/p/the-spiritual-blessing-of-political.

² Minchillo, John. “Trump Supporters Gather Outside the Capitol, Wednesday, Jan. 6, 2021, in Washington. (AP Photo/John Minchillo).” AP PHOTOS: Scenes of Violence at U.S. Capitol Shock World, Associated Press, 6 Jan. 2021.

Image: storage.googleapis.com/afs-prod/media/8752c258f12a40b69e5f4ba4f9ecb3ef/2000.jpeg

Article: https://apnews.com/article/joe-biden-donald-trump-electoral-college-elections-de812995a8c7cbea5c1de56a3d1aa007

³ Spocchia, Gino. “Shocking Video Shows AP Photographer Attacked at Capitol Riots.” The Independent, Independent Digital News and Media, 8 Jan. 2021, www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-election-2020/capitol-riot-congress-ap-antifa-b1784648.html.

⁴ Bauder, David. “Journalists Recount Harrowing Attacks amid Capitol Riot.” ABC News, ABC News Network, 8 Jan. 2021, abcnews.go.com/Entertainment/wireStory/journalists-recount-harrowing-attacks-amid-capitol-riot-75143696.

⁵ Warren, Tish Harrison. “We Worship with the Magi, Not MAGA.” ChristianityToday.com, Christianity Today, 7 Jan. 2021, www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2021/january-web-only/trump-capitol-mob-election-politics-magi-not-maga.html.

⁶ “Bible Gateway Passage: Romans 13:9-10 - English Standard Version.” Bible Gateway, The Holy Bible, English Standard Version. ESV® Text Edition: 2016. Copyright © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a Publishing Ministry of Good News Publishers., https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=romans+13%3A9-10&version=ESV.

^{7 “Bible Gateway Passage: Micah 6:8 - New International Version.” Bible Gateway, Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV® Copyright ©1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.®, www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Micah+6%3A8&version=NIV.}

⁸ French, David. “How We Heal.” The French Press, The Dispatch, 1 Nov. 2020, frenchpress.thedispatch.com/p/how-we-heal.

Let All Mortal Flesh Keep Silence

I found myself singing Let All Mortal Flesh Keep Silence on Wednesday evening (Dec 23^rd). It was printed in the bulletin emailed out in advance of Old Orchard Church’s Christmas Eve service, and when I saw it listed there, it just sort of stuck in my head. It feels particularly fitting—musically as well as thematically—in 2020. There’s a fresh sense of brokenness, of the desperate need for rescue and restoration. The world is a raw nerve. In the midst of the physical and economic and political and emotional carnage, finally—finally—we see a great Light.

It is a marvel, wholly beyond our wildest imaginings, that God Himself would descend into our ruined glory—walking in the dust from which He formed us, bleeding for our healing, dying to give us life—that He might remake us whole and holy, restored into unhindered fellowship with Him. It seems only fitting to respond with awe and praise.

In that vein, here’s a bit of poetry I wrote yesterday (Dec 27^th) in which I attempted to combine that theme with the theme of this blog:

A Stranger Under the Sun 

Oh, I have been lost and, oh, I have been found
I wander from birth 'til I sleep in the ground
Saw mountain-tops shine where He hid not His face
And valleys well-filled with invisible grace
Rough places made plain and great plains made well-rough
And rivers of fear that grace wasn't enough

Oh, I have been lost but, oh, I have been found
by the God who deigned walk in the dust of the ground
My cries reached his ears and He hid not His face
But poured out His blood in a torrent of grace
Wherever I wander, no matter how rough
He walks there beside me; His grace is enough.

I chose the poem title as a reference to a line in G.K. Chesterton's excellent poem, below. I absolutely love how he wove the imagery and structural parallels together to convey the emotional and theological significance of the Incarnation.

The House of Christmas

There fared a mother driven forth
Out of an inn to roam;
In the place where she was homeless
All men are at home.
The crazy stable close at hand,
With shaking timber and shifting sand,
Grew a stronger thing to abide and stand
Than the square stones of Rome.

For men are homesick in their homes,
And strangers under the sun,
And they lay their heads in a foreign land
Whenever the day is done.
Here we have battle and blazing eyes,
And chance and honor and high surprise,
But our homes are under miraculous skies
Where the yule tale was begun.

A Child in a foul stable,
Where the beasts feed and foam,
Only where He was homeless
Are you and I at home;
We have hands that fashion and heads that know,
But our hearts we lost – how long ago!
In a place no chart nor ship can show
Under the sky’s dome.

This world is wild as an old wives’ tale,
And strange the plain things are,
The earth is enough and the air is enough
For our wonder and our war;
But our rest is as far as the fire-drake swings
And our peace is put in impossible things
Where clashed and thundered unthinkable wings
Round an incredible star.

To an open house in the evening
Home shall men come,
To an older place than Eden
And a taller town than Rome.
To the end of the way of the wandering star,
To the things that cannot be and that are,
To the place where God was homeless
And all men are at home.

Wanderlust the Blog, Reimagined.

So.

It's been a long time: more than six years.

Six. Years.

A lot can happen—has happened—in six years.

So why now?  Why resurrect a travel-themed blog when I haven't taken an international flight since November 2014 when we moved back to the States from South Korea?  The adventures since then have mainly been metaphorical rather than geographical, with a handful of notable exceptions (like a road trip from STL to Virginia in 2019...but that's a saga best left for another day).

More to the point, why resurrect a travel-themed blog when I've not gone further than ~70 miles from my front door since the COVID-19 pandemic's waves of quarantines first reached St. Louis in mid-March 2020?  These days, in all honesty:

(Yes, Supernatural even has a gif for that, apparently.)

So why dredge up this insignificant corner of the interwebs now?  Maybe it's self-indulgent, but I've realized that I still have things I want to say—things that I think still fit with the overarching theme of this blog.  I've written a great deal in the past few years in the course of processing a number of life events and this seems like a reasonable place to share selections of those thoughts.

So: Wanderlust the Blog, Reimagined.

It's not always a literal wandering.  Sometimes it's a professional wandering through grad school and career changes.  Sometimes it's a physical or emotional wandering through the harsh landscape of chronic illness.  Sometimes it's a spiritual wandering through green pastures, across lonely deserts, beside still waters, or even through the valley of the shadow of death.  I'm a citizen of heaven, a life-long expat wandering here on earth, eagerly awaiting the return of my King.

Speaking of returning kings, it seems fitting to elaborate on the source of the quotation in this blog's header as part of the grounds for this blog-reimagining.  Odds are that most of you reading this blog don't need additional context for that quotation because either because you know me well or we happen to overlap in a Venn diagram of literary tastes, but please bear with me for a minute, okay?

In J.R.R. Tolkien's The Fellowship of the Ring, a poem known as the Riddle of Strider appears which prophetically describes Aragorn, the titular king of the third book in the Lord of the Rings trilogy:

All that is gold does not glitter;
Not all those who wander are lost;
The old that is strong does not wither;
Deep roots are not reached by the frost.

From the ashes a fire shall be woken,
A light from the shadows shall spring;
Renewed shall be blade that was broken,
The crownless again shall be king.

While I'm confident that a great deal has already been written elsewhere about these stanzas by far more learnéd and eloquent individuals than myself, I want to highlight what resonates with me.  There is something unwavering—settled, even—about Aragorn the wanderer as described in the first stanza, something which is not buffeted about by his nomadic circumstances.  Yes, he has fears and doubts which hold him back from claiming his rightful kingship for a significant part of the trilogy.  Yes, he spends many years as a wanderer, but his character is rooted in something deeper, something that eventually drives him to take up the crown and title when Gondor's need is greatest.  It is this inner character—his courage, his compassion, his commitment to justice and to peace—which informs his actions as a warrior, healer, lover, and friend throughout the saga.  He doesn't undergo a fundamental transformation when he becomes king.  He continues to be who he already was.  The addition of a crown doesn't make him a good king; his extant moral center does.

So what does that have to do with me and with this blog?  The truth is that my physical and metaphorical wanderings over the years have encompassed both aimless exile and wonder-filled exploration.  I'll skip the specifics for now, but since I started this blog just over a decade ago, I've spent a lot of time asking myself the following questions:

When thing after thing after thing is stripped away, what is left of me?  Who am I, deep down where the frost doesn't reach?

I've written thousands of words in the past decade in the course of verbal-processing some answers to those questions, and doubtless I'll write thousands more before my journey ends.  I've decided some of those words will end up here on this blog, serving as a chronicle of both the literal and metaphorical miles I travel.  And maybe, just maybe, someone will find something edifying—whether hope, or solidarity, or challenge—as they traverse the hills and valleys of my words with me.

When Bilbo sets out for Rivendell in The Fellowship of the Ring, he sings:

The Road goes ever on and on,

Down from the door where it began.

No far ahead the Road has gone,

And I must follow, if I can,

Pursuing it with eager feet,

Until it joins some larger way

Where many paths and errands meet.

And whither then? I cannot say.

What I can say is this: I am a blade that has been broken, but God is reforging me, piece by piece.

Now You Can Simply Walk Into Mordor

So there's a mountain in New Zealand that they used as Mt Doom when filming the Lord of the Rings trilogy.  Drew and I did a day hike (~20km) called the Tongariro Alpine Crossing.  It winds through the old lava flows, up the side slopes of Mt Ngauruhoe, across several other ridges, then down through tundra and forest trails.  Here's a quick batch of phone-photos from today's adventure:

I'll share the real-camera photos later on. :)

Cheers,

Emily 

Memorial Day 2014

Just a few quick thoughts...

May 26th was two very important things this year--Memorial Day and my sweet husband's 24th birthday.

It's Tuesday morning here now.  I intentionally focused on my husband's birthday yesterday rather than Memorial Day, but now he's back at work and my mind is going where I wouldn't let it go--not really--yesterday:

The combination of the holiday and his birthday is particularly poignant because my husband is a soldier--a field artillery officer, at that.  That means things are /supposed/ to explode at work, even when everything's going well.  And we're talking powerful explosions. When we were stationed at Ft. Sill, OK, the shock waves from the high explosive rounds made our brick chimney rattle even though we lived more than a mile from the firing range.

Soldiers can be killed even when they're not deployed.  A fatal training accident in my husband's unit last fall is a tragic testament to that fact.  One small error during a field exercise the week before Thanksgiving cost two US soldiers their lives and left behind two grieving widows and three fatherless children between them.  One of those men was the best mentor Drew's had in his entire Army career.  So I'm thinking of those families today in particular.

I'm already a worrywart by nature, and being married to a soldier makes it harder than ever to give my worries over to God.  I admit that ever since November's training accident, I'm terrified for Drew's safety each time he goes to the field for training.  I beg God to keep him safe because I don't know what I'd do without him.  I feel like if anything happened to him, my world would fall apart and I'd never be able to pick up the pieces--and I don't think I'd even want to.  I know empirically that life would go on--the thousands of brave war widows out there through the years are proof of that--and I know empirically that God would put me back together again, piece by piece, because He's in the business of restoration, but I know it would be a long time before I could even begin to accept that emotionally (if ever) and I know I would never be the same.

Knowing that I might lose my husband, my best friend, at any moment really isn't unique to military wives, though.  We don't know how many days God has ordained for each of us or which day will be our last.  It could be a car accident or a sudden illness just as easily as a high explosive round or a North Korean shell.  In fact, yesterday was also the 10th anniversary of a car accident that could have killed or crippled me, but I walked away unscathed by the grace of God--yet another poignant reminder of both our mortality and God's gracious sustaining hand.  So instead of dwelling on fear, I really do try instead to make the most of the time we do have together.  

I try to celebrate every milestone and season--I think I might drive Drew a bit nuts since he's much less of an events/holidays/pomp-and-circumstance kind of person than I am by nature.  This weekend we celebrated his birthday.  We also celebrate anniversaries (dating, engagement, and wedding).  We celebrate official holidays (Thanksgiving, Christmas) and unofficial holidays (Halfway-through-active-duty Day, cherry blossom season, Pi Day).  And we have date nights as often as possible (one of the perks of not having kids quite yet).

I try to tell my husband how much I love him and how much he means to me every single day so that, no matter when his or my last day comes, he will know beyond a doubt that I love him and I will have no regrets for things unsaid.

Today, even as my heart breaks for families who've lost a loved one in service to their country, I choose to be grateful for the time I do have with my best friend, my hero, and to be grateful for the freedoms Americans enjoy because of brave men and women like my husband who willingly put their lives on the line for our freedom.  I also turn my heart toward Heaven, eagarly waiting for the day when the Risen Christ will restore all things and wipe ever tear from our eyes.  Come quickly, Lord Jesus.

Drew, thank you for your service. I love you with all my heart.

Waiting Room

"I am sure that God keeps no one waiting unless He sees that it is good for him to wait."

-C.S. Lewis

"Lord, You have always marked

the road for the coming day;

and though it may be hidden,

today I believe.

Lord, You have always lightened

this darkness of mine;

and though the night is here,

today I believe.

Lord, You have always spoken

when time was ripe;

and though you be silent now,

today I believe." 

-Excerpt from the Northumbria Community's Evening Prayer

"Wait for the Lord; be strong and take heart and wait for the Lord."

-Psalm 27:14 NIV

That's right, ladies and gentlemen.  I'm pulling my novel-in-progress out of mothballs in April to try to boost my word count through Camp Nanowrimo.  I'm adding a poll on the top of the blog--weigh in about whether or not you'd like me to post excerpts over the course of the month.

I just finished my outline for the entire rest of the novel on the plane back to Korea on Monday, so I'm pretty stoked.  Looking forward to getting all those scenes on paper!

Cheers,
Emily

Sometimes, Korea is gorgeous.

Especially in the fall.  Like today:

Just a quick photo on post of the chapel that I volunteer at with PWOC (that's Protestant Women of the Chapel, a military-sponsored ministry of the on-post chapel system).

Is God artistic or what?! Days like this make me wish I was a painter or professional quality photographer so I could do better justice to the beauty around me.

And did I mention there are mountains here?! Seriously, my favorite thing about Korea is the landscape. Hands down.

Also, there are ginkgo trees everywhere. I love how they turn bright yellow, then drop all their leaves basically in one day:

But, alas, I'm spending most of my afternoon inside a Starbucks (which by the way has completely switched over from Halloween to winter/holiday decorations in the past 24 hours), trying to focus on grad apps. Back to the grindstone! :)

Cheers,

Emily

430 days later...better late than never, right?

Ahem. So. Before you say anything: I know. "Blog" implies more frequent posts than every, oh, 430 days. Yes, I said I know.

In my defense, I have many times thought of blogging but didn't know what I wanted to say or couldn't make up my mind how to say it.  I started drafts, only to never publish them; some still languish in my drafts folder.  I thought I wanted to write the perfect first Korea post...but since I couldn't make the perfect post, I didn't post anything. At all. For 430 days.

Maybe that should have been a hint--a few hundred days ago. Oh well. Better late than never.  My new blogging goal is to post more frequent (and therefore probably shorter) verbal and visual snapshots of our crazy, funny, frustrating, challenging, beautiful life: the nitty-gritty wherein all the humor, joy, pain, love, and faith really dwell.  Feel free to hold me accountable to that, dear readers (if there are any of you still out there after my extensive hiatus).

Now that we've got that out of the way:

Today, I took the GRE, which would normally be bad enough.

But I took it in a foreign country.

Where I don't speak the language at all. (Seriously, I've been here 14 months and my entire Korean vocabulary barely registers in the double digits. It's embarrassing.)

Anyway, the GRE.  I was seriously the only native English speaker in the testing facility. And the only one who couldn't read the wall signs and sign-in instructions, which were in Korean.  I had to ask complete strangers for help. Fortunately, because they were all there to take an English language exam, they were able (and kind enough) to help direct me.

God is gracious because I totally had peace and a sense of humor about the whole thing.

What's more, I totally had peace about the exam itself.  Which is even more unusual given the lead-up to today.

See, the fact that I was even taking it today is a bit of a funny story in itself:

I only decided that I was, in fact, going to take it AT ALL about 2 WEEKS AGO.  I'd been nominally studying vocab on and off for some time with Drew because he plans to take it next year and we both figured I might take it eventually.  He'd practice GRE words by using them in conversation with me wherever he could fit them in.  Usually this results in a lot of laughter, because I can often tell when he's just trying to get a test-word in there instead of using the other big words he'd normally employ.  But that is neither here nor there.  As I was saying, bits and dabs of GRE studying that amounted to very little so far.  But then in mid September, we realized that the best window of opportunity for me to go get my master's would be...*drumroll*... next fall! That's right. Mid-September 2013 I decided to apply for Fall 2014 admission to vocal pedagogy master's programs.  Which mainly have December 2013 deadlines.

Yikes. 

So anyway, over the next few weeks I researched a lot and decided on some schools and, lo and behold, several wanted a GRE score. By December.  

Double yikes.  

Ok, so that's less than ideal, I thought, but it's only mid October by this point and I figured I could take it mid November, so I can have a month to study.  I started exploring practice tests. About 4 days went by. I went to sign up for the GRE online, still thinking mid November would work for me.  And maybe I would be able to take it on post at the Education center. That'd be nice and convenient.

BUT NO.

Turns out it takes up to two weeks before the GRE scores even get sent to the schools you designate on test day.  And the latest available testing date in South Korea that would guarantee enough time for scores to reach schools by the deadlines was October 30th.  In Seoul. Not on post where we live.  In SEOUL (near a train station I've never stopped at before, by the way). Which, for anyone rusty on their Korean geography, is 1.5 hours by train from Dongducheon, the small city we live in that's halfway between Seoul and the DMZ.

This keeps getting better and better.

But I decided to look on the bright side: it's an adventure! Plus, I wouldn't have to angst about the test for months and I could be really, really motivated about studying--it's just 10 days, after all.

Yep.  TEN DAYS.  Triple yikes.

So I booked a hotel for the night before the test at the US military post in Seoul, took the train down, and figured out where the heck the testing center was, while looking painfully touristy with my overnight bag, my phone-gps clutched in one hand, and my printout of the building location from Google maps in the other. (Because calculating routes in English doesn't work in google maps for Korea.  Super-convenient, I know.)

(A quick snapshot of a temporary construction wall/barrier I walked past on my way to find the test site last night...yes, it is decorated with helpful PSA-style diagrams of how to make an origami rhinoceros...further down the wall were diagrams of origami elephants and ostriches, too.)

Anyway, I finally found the test center!  Here's a fuzzy in-the-dark picture of the awesome artsy-architecture that is the Fulbright Building in Seoul.

Anyway, after scribbling notes on my map-print-out to reassure myself I'd be able to find the place again in a timely manner in the morning, I headed to my hotel for the night. I snacked on bread slathered with Nutella (study incentive treat!) and educated myself about the essay formats on the test. I also retaught myself several general math concepts I discover I've completely forgotten--like factoring polynomials. In my defense, it has been over 7 years since I last took a proper math class. Wow, suddenly I feel a bit old. But I digress.

This is my favorite part: I stopped studying before bed, but that's when I started praying instead. And reading Philippians 3-4. Great chapters; you should totally check them out, dear readers.  And the apostle Paul, through the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, has totally awesome stuff to say about humility, pressing onward, prayer, and peace.  Phew.  Loaded passages, but exactly what God had for me right then.  What a timely reminder to practice humility in the face of the temptation to place my hope and trust in my academic record and intellectual abilities.  After all, they are not what define me, whether I succeeded or failed at this GRE attempt.  In God's eyes, I'm so horribly broken that all my best deeds and abilities are rubbish.  My good undergrad GPA?  My high standardized test scores in high school?  To borrow from Shakespeare, everything I am and have is but "quintessence of dust."  Or as the prophet Isaiah put it: "All flesh is grass, and all its beauty is like the flower of the field.  The grass withers, the flower fades when the breath of the LORD blows on it; surely the people are grass" (Isaiah 40:6b-7 ESV).  But--Praise God!--He didn't leave me like that.  He gave Himself on the cross so that I could "gain Christ" (Phil. 3)--my sins are atoned and Christ's righteousness adorns my shoulders, hiding equally the rubbish of both my sins and my best efforts underneath.

The chapters in Philippians go on to chronicle Paul's thought process--the "now what," if you will.  He exhorts his readers to join him in "forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead...press[ing] on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus" (Phil. 3:13b-14 ESV).  Those are good words, especially to a perfectionist like me who tends to get hung up on past failures as well as past successes, both of which can prevent me equally from excelling in my academic pursuits and from living abundantly in my relationship with God.

I reached chapter 4 and again found just the words I needed at that moment--the "how" of doing that "now what."  How do I give it all to God and press forward in the confidence of His grace?  Paul gives us the answer in verse 6-7: "Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God.  And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus" (ESV).  I remembered how just over two weeks ago, we had a guest speaker at PWOC (the women's ministry on post that I volunteer with) who spoke about prayer from these verses.  Her acronym for a template for prayer came back to me: PRAY.  That's Praise, Repent, Ask, Yield.  Praise God for who He is, Repent by agreeing with God about your sin and turning from it to Him, Ask for what you need or are worried about, then Yield the results to His perfect will.  So I did that, right then.  It's been a rough several years spiritually for me--lots of highs and lows for a variety of reasons (if you haven't been in the loop on that, feel free to ask, but that's another long story for another day or another post; it mostly involves me blaming God for stuff and then having a hard time believing He's forgiven me for blaming Him for so long).  Honestly a lot of times when I pray, I struggle to get past the confession stage of prayer.  It's not that I'm not confessing; I guess I mostly get hung up on the being forgiven part.  I struggle to believe that I've really confessed enough (which doesn't really even make sense theologically, but there you go: things we believe without basis that get in the way of abundant life) or that God's not still somehow disappointed with me and therefore not forgiven me or restored me to the full joy of His salvation (also an unsound thing to believe theologically but a tough idea to shake once it grabs on).  Anyway, for the first time in quite a while, I really felt forgiven.  I know that the truth is that I am forgiven always in Christ, but there is such joy in recognizing that all over again.  Before I went to bed, I praised God, confessed, and actually accepted the forgiveness I know He's always been giving me.

This morning, based on the boldness of knowing I'm really forgiven, I dared to ask.  It was a beautiful fall Korean morning--God's artistry evident in the changing colors, the chill in the air, and sweet smell of changing seasons in the light breeze.  This was the view from my window this morning at sunrise when I was getting up (sorry the pic's so blurry and has window-reflections...but it was just too pretty a sunrise not to try to give you a taste):

Anyway, I had such peace.  I was completely at peace with how the test might go.  I trusted God, and I put no stock in my own abilities or insecurities.  I just pressed on toward the goal.  Before I started the test (once I'd navigated the language barriers at the testing center!), I paused to really pray again.  I dared to ask God for a better outcome to the test than I had dared to hope for, the kind of result that could only be from Him.  Then, still full of His peace, I yielded the whole thing to Him.  Each new sheet of scratch paper, each section of the exam, I yielded to Him.  It was a really great experience.  Never thought I'd say that about the GRE, but really, it had nothing to do with the GRE.  It was just where I happened to be when I was yielding my steps to God.

By the time I was finished, I felt really good about how it had gone and I still felt at peace.  And that's when they tell you your "unofficial" score at the end (that is, your scores for the parts of the test that can be scored electronically on site).  Man, God really answered my prayer.  I am still kind of in shock that He actually did.  Oh, me of little faith. ;)  Anyway, there is no way it should have gone as smoothly as it did nor that I should have earned that good a score, definitely not with the crammed timeline or the geographic and linguistic complications.  But there it is, added permanently to my academic record: Proof that sometimes God does answer our prayers for the things we think are too big to ask for.  More importantly, for me it will be an Ebenezer during the next several weeks of application frenzy and several additional weeks or months of waiting for acceptance/rejection letters: God is in control of the process.  PRAY.  Then rest in His will.

That is exactly what I failed to do the last time I applied to grad school, and the bad experience I had with the process last time around was one contributing factor in kicking off such a long and difficult period in my walk with God.  I hope and pray this is a chance to come full-circle; a chance for God to do a healing and growing work in me.  Maybe this time, I can trust Him each step of the way and see His hand more clearly, finding healing from past pains and renewed faith and joy in following His plan for my life.

Soli Deo Gloria!
-Emily

5

Only 5 days until I see my husband!!!

Five Things I Will Miss About St. Louis:

5.  Forest Park. There are so many cool things to see and do there, and many of them are free, like the Zoo, the Muny, portions of the museums, and all the hiking/biking trails!  Additionally, there's

4.  Free concerts and performances.  They're everywhere in St. Louis in the summer.  Seriously.  At the zoo, at the Botanical Gardens, at the small municipal parks, in Forest Park (annual Shakespeare in the Park festival), and of course, at the Muny.

3.  The small-town feel and pride with the population/sprawl of a big city.  Even with a metropolitan area of roughly 3 million people (last I heard), everyone still loves the same home-town team (Go Cards!), "Meet Me in St. Louis" is a perennial favorite at the Muny (and everyone in the audience can sing along with the title song with gusto), nearly every driver has picked up the same set of driving-style quirks (St. Louis rolling stop, anyone?), our city's rich historical heritage is celebrated at nearly every possible opportunity, and every St. Louisan knows that when you meet another St. Louisan (especially outside of STL), you will ALWAYS ask (or be asked) where you went to high school!

2.  The Cardinals.  'Nuff said.

1.  The food.  Ted Drewes, Italian from The Hill, St. Louis-style ribs, St. Louis Bread Company, toasted ravioli, Imo's, and provel cheese.  Mmm, now I'm hungry...


Time for a midnight snack, then a good night's sleep before another day of getting ready for Korea! :)

Play Ball!
-Emily

6

Only 6 days to go! :)

Six Things I Expect I Will Miss About the USA:

6. Things being written in English.  Being close to a military post will lessen this factor, but road signs, grocery shopping, and asking for directions are all going to be a bit more...eventful.

5. Familiar traffic laws and signs.  To drive in Korea, Drew and I have to get additional USFK licenses through the Army to operate a POV (personally owned vehicle) on the streets of South Korea.  Sounds like it won't be too hard to get that additional license, but the street signs will be different and I hear traffic flow there is CRAZY.

4. The 2nd Amendment.  I know this sounds weird, but for a household that's used to having guns/bowie knives/big kitchen knives and knowing how to use them properly, moving to a country where--other than Drew's military-issue firearms which would be kept on post, I believe, we can't even legally have a firearm in our home (Koreans who hunt have to jump through a bunch of hoops to even acquire a firearm for hunting, and when they successfully do, the have to store their firearms at the local law enforcement offices except during the hunting season itself).  Drew was even questioned at customs regarding whether or not our shipment of household goods contained weapons, including kitchen knives.  Good thing we didn't pack the replica claymore!  I guess, as an American who appreciates the 2nd amendment, I find it a bit unsettling to be moving to within 20 miles or so of hostile North Korean forces, who'd kill me without a second thought given the chance, and not be legally allowed to keep anything more (or equally, apparently) dangerous than a santoku knife in my home for self-defense!

3. Shopping for clothes may prove a bit tricky.  As an average-height American woman (5'6") with a non-twig figure who favors thrift stores for her clothing purchases, finding clothing that fits in Asia outside of the Army PX (post exchange) may prove a bit challenging...but I found out Target ships to APO addresses, so it's all good, right? ;)

2. I may actually miss my dishwasher.  We thought our apartment was going to have a dishwasher...and then we later found out that the thing we thought was a dishwasher was actually a kimchi drawer.  Apparently you can't keep kimchi in the same refrigerator as the rest of your food or else EVERYTHING in there would smell like kimchi.  My guess is we'll probably use it as a beer/wine refrigerator instead...

1. Family and Friends.  All of you are precious to me and I will miss you all dearly while we're gone.  But we have a guest bedroom now and we'd love visitors! :D

And now I should get back to packing...after all, I only have 6 days before I see my love again!

Cheers,
Emily

7

Seven days to Korea! :)

And...

Seven Things I Still Have To Do Before I Leave:

7.  Laundry. A fair amount of it, actually (or maybe mountain would be a better word choice).

6. Wash, clean, vacuum, and otherwise generally prepare our car to be shipped across the Pacific. And it may take some scrubbing, given that I think the only washing it's received it in the past two months has been rain...and we are in the middle of a remarkably severe drought...

5. Drive to Illinois to drop off said car at the shipping site.

4. Stencil a painted border onto my parents' kitchen (my dad and I have been promising my mom for many months, maybe even a year or two, that we'd do that for her...but now we're running out of time to finish the project before I leave...)

3. Organize the corner of the basement where my parents are graciously letting Drew and me store a bunch of stuff that couldn't/shouldn't have gone into Army storage in Lawton but which we can't or don't want to take to Korea with us...like Drew's battle-ready replica 16th century claymore and some very-lovely-but-easily-breakable wedding gifts...

2. Mow the lawn at least once more before I leave.

1. Did I mention I still need to pack?


Ok, ok, before anyone panics, I've started packed, but there's still a fair amount left to do (see #7). And there are other things on my to-do-before-leaving list; however, this is a representative sample, I think.

But only 7 days until I see Drew!!!!!

Cheers,
Emily

8

In honor of the countdown of days until I am reunited with my love in Korea(!), I am starting a series of numbered lists corresponding to the number of days remaining.

I know I'm a few hours behind on this first post in the above-mentioned series, but it was accurate when I scribbled the draft earlier this evening!  As promised in a previous post, I am elaborating on some thought on doing marriage when your love is thousands of miles away.  Without further ado, ladies and gentlemen, I give you the first list in the series:

Eight Things That Are Hard About This Long-Distance Marriage Thing:

8. The time difference is dumb.  With Drew's work schedule, the only times we've been able to skype are late in the evening for me (during his lunch hour) or early in the morning (late in the evening for him).  So if we want to talk, then basically one or the other of us has to have a bizarre sleep schedule, depending on the day and what time we pick to try to skype.  We have been blessed, though, that it's worked out that we could skype or talk or text or at the very least email back and forth almost every day since he's been gone.

7. Communication is harder because there are fewer chances to get the non-verbals. So much of human communication--especially with someone you're really close to, I think--is transmitted through pathways other than actual words, whether it's inflection, facial expressions, hand gestures (I do this constantly), or even posture or eye movements. Skype definitely helps with this, but sometimes poor lighting or poor internet quality distort the non-verbals so much that they can hinder as much as they help.

6.  Long-distance tests trust.  You aren't there, so even more than usual you have to trust that your spouse is trustworthy.  I know my sweet husband is 100% trustworthy (and I'm uber-grateful for that!), but nonetheless I've had to rely on my trust in him rather than first-hand knowledge of his devotion like if we were sharing a home. So in the long-run this is probably valuable for us, I think, because it's strengthened the trust, but I could imagine that this is hard for a lot of couples in similar situations.

5. It's hard to have shared experiences--you aren't able to go to church together, to hang out with other people together, to have dinner together, to see and experience the same events together, to even watch a movie together. So you miss out on opportunities to interact with one another over a shared experience.  Inside jokes are a lot harder when "you had to be there" but you couldn't be, y'know?

4. The flip-side of the lack of shared experiences is that you and your spouse are each having a completely different set of experiences and circumstances, so you're growing and adapting and thinking about and responding to totally different things.  So you have to be a lot more intentional about conveying personal narratives and telling anecdotes and generally communicating what you're thinking and feeling and how you're growing and changing (because the truth is we are all always growing and being shaped by our experiences and in turn shaping our future experiences and actions), because otherwise it's harder to grow together rather than grow apart.  It can definitely be done well, but it does take more work that when you're able to flop on the sofa together at the end of the day and just chat about stuff.

3. It's hard to just 'hang out'--yes, you get face time through video chat/VOIP pathways, but there's an intentionality to sitting down at your computer to spend time together that limits how much "just being there" that can happen--unless you both intentionally agree to "just hang out" and leave the video on while doing your own thing, like both reading books or something.  As one can imagine, that takes a lot of the spontaneity out of the "just being there."  Furthermore, since you only get a limited amount of time to share together each day or each week, you want to spend it catching up and making up for all the above-enumerated aspects of married life that are made more difficult by the distance, and you miss out on the just being together, the occasional doing-nothing together that is one of the most natural things about sharing a home with your best friend.

2. You miss out on the small stuff, which in many ways is one of my favorite things about being married to my best friend.  When you're thousands of miles apart, the following are just a handful of the kind of things that can't really happen: spontaneous dance parties in the kitchen to the music in your head, laughing at ridiculous billboards or signs while driving, sharing a funny or intelligent quote from a book as you're reading it, pointing out a really awesome sunset when it's suddenly the perfect mix of colors, stealing kisses when bumping into each other in a tiny apartment, falling asleep or waking up curled up together. Those sorts of things are some of the things I'm most looking forward to about joining Drew. :)

1. No hugs. And no kisses, either. This long-distance thing stinks. Only 8 days to go! :)

Ok, that was long and kinda depressing.  But I get to see Drew in less than 8 days now, which is decidedly NOT depressing! :D

Cheers,
Emily

FINALLY.

The wait is over:

I HAVE A PLANE TICKET.

FINALLY!

I officially leave STL at 8:30am CST on Thursday, August 30th, and arrive in Incheon, South Korea, at 3:20pm on Friday, August 31st.

Can't wait to see my Drew again!  We will have been apart for 8 and 1/2 weeks, including our first wedding anniversary.

Come on, August 30th!  Hurry up! :)

Cheers,

Emily

Korea Update

Ok, long time since the last Korea update...wow. We received official orders at the end of May, moved out of our apartment in Lawton at the end of June, drove to STL, I moved in temporarily with my parents, and a week later (July 2nd) Drew boarded a plane for South Korea.

We had applied for and were granted Command Sponsorship, which means that I am allowed to accompany him to South Korea officially (as in, the Army pays for my plane ticket as well as for his), but in exchange we have to stay 2 years from the date that I arrive, rather than Drew going by himself for one year (or me joining him on our dollar for one year).

Over half of our stuff by weight went into non-temporary storage (NTS) stateside until our return from Korea, and the rest was divided between an Unaccompanied Baggage shipment (UB, approx 1 month from pack-up to delivery in Korea), a Household Goods shipment (HHG, approx 2.5 months from pack-up until delivery in Korea--it travels by boat across the Pacific!), our suitcases, and my parents' house. My parents had graciously agreed to store an assortment of odds and ends that we either didn't want to put in storage or that we knew Korean law wouldn't allow us to take with us (like Drew's 4.5ft battle-ready replica Scottish claymore). So we loaded those things into our little Civic and drove the 9+ hours to STL.

I am still in STL, waiting for the Army to finish their end of the paperwork and issue a plane ticket to me. We expect it will take at least another 3 weeks to a month before I might have a plane ticket in hand, possibly longer, and it's unclear how they'll determine my travel dates. Long story short, I'll be in STL until at least the last week of August. This unfortunately means that Drew and I will be apart for a minimum of 7+ weeks. Ironically, both my 25th birthday (yikes!) and our first wedding anniversary fall within those 7 weeks of separation. Sometimes being a military household stinks. But I knew that was a possibility even before we got married, so I've been preparing emotionally for the possibility of separation during milestones for a long time.  (More thoughts on long-distance marriage in another forthcoming post...)  Fortunately, we got to celebrate our anniversary early with a quick mid-week getaway in the week between arriving in STL and Drew's flight to Korea.

I am missing my husband constantly, but at the same time I'm savoring the extra time with family and friends before moving across the globe.  And I'm getting more excited all the time about new adventures waiting for us in Korea.  In closing:

Dear Army,
  Please hurry up and give me a plane ticket, ok?  I miss my husband.
Love, Emily

Incentive

I'm making this public in hopes that it will inspire me to work even harder to be healthier than I've already been trying...

MyFitnessPal - Free Calorie Counter

Official Countdown to the End of Drew's Army Commitment: