Joy Ride

You know how Jesus was tempted in the wilderness? Well, I am currently being tested on page 73 of the new J. Crew catalog. It helps to know that Jesus understands what I am going through.

Just for some background on this story, let me say this: I am not a shoe person. I do not buy shoes. The following is a list of my entire shoe inventory.

- Black Mary Jane heals
- Brown flats that I wear to work
- Black boots that my mother gave me for my birthday
- Gym shoes that I bought at Wal Mart for under $15 in high school
- Tennis shoes that my parents-in-law gave me for Hilton Head Island clay courts
- Champagne heals that I wore to my wedding
- 3 pairs of Old Navy Flip Flops

I have spent approximately $30 on shoes this year, and about $60 on shoes in the five years prior, combined. Shoes simply are not a priority for me. However.

About a year ago I read about driving shoes. Some character in some book put on a pair of driving shoes, which I thought sounded pretty cool. So I looked up driving shoes online, and I fell in shoe love. It was the kind of shoe love that I thought was only possible in fairy tales or for my friend Bethany. Driving shoes are kind of like moccasins, kind of like loafers, and they look so comfortable. I started daydreaming about throwing on my pair of driving shoes, tying a scarf in my hair, and leisurely walking through a bookstore or the supermarket. All of my mundane life seemed much cooler in a pair of driving shoes.

Over this last year, my vision of these shoes has morphed into something very specific, the way years of looking at wedding magazines formed a mental design of a dress that nobody happened to make the year I got married. Tumbled leather or suede (I'm talking about the shoes again, not the wedding dress), gold buckle, minimal detail. Yellow. At first I thought white, which would be more practical. But a deep, mustard, perfect yellow... yes. Yellow.

And so yesterday, as you can imagine, I almost dropped the J. Crew catalog when I flipped open its center page, and there on page 73 was a pair of suede, gold buckled, simply detailed, deep mustard-yellow driving mocs. My name was on it. Literally. The top of the page reads like this:

--JOY
----RIDE
---OUR NEW ITALIAN
------------DRIVING MOCS

The glossy page seemed to turn suede as I fingered over the image. Behind the yellow shoe was a perfect white driving shoe, which I paused to admire before returning my gaze back to the golden object of my desire. After a few moments of unfettered lust, I reluctantly skimmed the 5 pt. font in the bottom left corner until I found the price.

In the wilderness, Jesus said, "Get behind me, Satan."

On page 73, Joy said, "Well, if I divide that price by the number of times that I'll wear them..."

After about three minutes of mental justifications and false entitlement arguments, I gave up. Now I'm just staring at the page that I've torn out and hung over my desk in a method of self-torture. It's not about whether it's okay to buy nice things for yourself, or whether my friends are right or wrong to buy expensive shoes or lots of shoes. There are plenty of things that I could stop spending my money on. The only thing that this comes down to is the fact that the shoes are too expensive, and that I should not buy them. And that's really the end of that.

After a lifetime of Loreal commercials telling me that "I'm worth it," it's hard to remember that I don't deserve good things. I don't deserve any of the good things in my life, and I don't deserve these shoes; everything that I have and that I buy is a gift. Someday I will probably buy a pair - not because I deserve them, but because I'm at a different season in my budget or find them on sale. For now, page 73 is serving well as a free piece of wall art.

Satan is nipping at my heals, but he's not biting off any yellow suede.

Settling

I like to live on the edge as much as the next girl. In fact, I think I like life on the edge even more than the next girl. When Pete asked me if I would marry him, the underlying question was, "Do you mind living in Grand Rapids while I fly airplanes for an undetermined amount of time before I take you and our children to a yet-to-be determined continent for another undetermined amount of time?"

And I said, "Show me da RING!" (Actually, that was the underlying meaning to the sweet "yes" that I gave him.) Living in the moment is something that I signed up for, and something that I take pleasure in.

But after five months of limbo, here is why knowing where I am going to live for the next three years is so much better than not knowing where I'm going to live for the next three years:

Because in every way, it is.

Hands down, no contest, it is so much better.

Today Pete got the We're Going in a Different Direction letter that he's been dreading from a flight company in Virginia. By all accounts he should have gotten the job. They said they were hiring, he has the experience needed, he went to apply face-to-face, the interviews went well, and they've been encouraging him all along to finish his requirements. The only thing that would make sense of it is if God actually answered our prayers for a clean "no" if the job wasn't best for our marriage and our future.

There are a lot of reasons why this job was potentially bad for our marriage and our future. For one thing, Pete would have had to travel up to three weeks at a time, and I'm sorry, but we sucked at long distance relationship. 14 hours is a long car ride from your family, friends and support system, especially when you're thinking of having your first baby in the next couple of years. And the surveillance work that Pete was going to be doing... well... he told me once, casually, that it wasn't "the safest thing" that he could be doing. So if any of those things would have caused unnecessary damage (or, you know, death) I am deeply thankful for the We're Going In a Different Direction letter that Pete got in the mail today. And he seems okay, too.

The first thing that we decided to do is update our car registration. Next, we're going to move to an apartment with more space and a washer and drier, because two years is a long time to live in essentially one room with hardly any clean underwear, let me tell you. After we update our car registration and move to a new apartment, we're going to go ahead and get really attached to a lot of friends, instead of preparing to say goodbye. And in January, we're both going back to school.

Knowing where you're going to live is so much better than not knowing where you're going to live, especially when you get to live next to a church you love, a community you've invested in, friends you enjoy, and an afternoon's drive from family.

And to top it all off, I woke up this morning knowing exactly who I am going to vote for.

I haven't felt this settled in a long time.

.

Autumn

Every fall I think about getting older. My birthday is in December, but December is when I occupy my mind with hateful criticisms of American consumerism. By mid-December I am considering donating all of my earthly possessions save a bowl, a spoon and two outfits; by December 21st I am rushing to the mall, realizing that I've waited too long to knit 17 scarves or learn how to write decent poems. So my birthday month is much too busy to contemplate the fact that my finite life is progressing with alarming consistency.

Autumn is a better season to think about aging, anyways. As kids, fall was like a group birthday when you and all of your friends instantly turned a grade older. But more importantly, it is during fall that you can turn onto a street and see that a tree has turned flame orange overnight, even though you know it must have shown signs of changing on all the previous days that you passed by. If that doesn't capture the same shock of aging then I'm not sure what does. Time moves visually through fall; nature glitters robustly, then dies at warped speed.

As a teenager, I decided that I would rather fear 'dying young' than 'aging'. To fear dying young means that I drive carefully; to fear aging is a very helpless feeling. So I try not to text while I drive, I put on sunblock, and I look forward to each new age. Now that I've passed all the young milestone birthdays, 30 is the next big birthday to consider.

I asked my mom if she was depressed on her 30th birthday, and she told me that she wasn't been depressed at all; in fact, she had been quite pleased with herself for turning 30. I think I already know what she means. If 21 was when I started to feel like an adult, 30 is when I expect to feel like an honest-to-goodness woman whom people should really take seriously. 30 is the age that I'm going to start subscribing to magazines. I'm holding out hope that my voice may deepen a little, as though I have a slight cold. I also hope to wear glasses when I'm 30, but only for reading.

It's still about 8 years too early to think about which magazines to subscribe to, so this autumn I'm taking a step back and sizing myself up and my current age: 21. 22, come December.

What am I in my early 20s that I will never be again? Is this the thinnest that I'll ever be without having to diet? Is this the most carefree my marriage will be before retirement? Is my last chance to travel Europe with Pete, and stay in Greece by myself after he returns home? Are these my last couple years before I am a mother, and thus my last couple years to draw untroubled breaths? I don't want to breeze past my early 20s before truly understanding what they offer me.

This past Friday, Pete and I went to a high school football game at East Grand Rapids. On our way back to the car, Pete held my hand even though it was pulled up into the arm of my fleece. He always gets nostalgic about high school because he loved those years. I loved many things about my teen years, but high school was not one of them. "I would do High School all over again," Pete said, and I agreed. I would do High School all over again - but this time I would join tennis, write for the school newspaper, and relax a little about my grades. Pete would do high school all over again, I suspect, exactly like he did it in the first place.

I want to look back on my early 20s and know that I would do it all over exactly as I did it in the first place, starting with the little vacation we're taking this weekend to enjoy the fall colors. Soon the trees will give into winter, crisp and golden, leaf by leaf. And I will be happy that I spent time and gas money to drive by them in their glamor.

6:00 am.

No one has ever accused me of being a morning person, but if they did, I would be ready to go toe to toe with my accuser. Because the facts are on my side.

FACT:

This morning Pete woke me up as we was leaving for work, and I looked up at him with the same puffy, bewildered eyes that I always greet him with early morning, along with my bad-breath kiss for which I always apologize.

But this particular morning, something was wrong. Terribly wrong. There was this... this... strange sensation in my neck! It felt like, sandpaper? No! Well, kind of. But also like I had swallowed something very sticky, like honey, followed by a mouthful of teeny tiny thorns.

"Pete! There's something wrong!"

"What's wrong?"

"I can't - I can't tell. It's like..." I swallowed twice, very intently. "It's like I swallowed something terrible that sticking to the sides of my neck and it feels AWFUL."

He waited a moment, then asked, "Do you have a sore throat?"

I contemplated this.

"Yes. I have a sore throat. That's right."

Pete: "Well, I hope you feel better."

"Thank you."

And this is why I don't think I should for any reason be forced to wake myself before nine in the morning. Because before 9, I forget words and basic concepts, which I think are very important in knowing when and when not to panic, especially when you wake up feeling like you've just gulped a handful of teeny tiny thorns.

Campaign Advertising

In one of my previous posts, my good pal Nick corrected me and said that the campaigns are not spending millions of dollars to earn my vote, because I don't live in a swing state. Either Nick forgot that I live in Michigan, or else he was plain wrong. I do live in a swing state, as evidenced by the yellow glove in the above map, wikipedia, CNN, and the fact that I have been subjected to a mind-numbing volume of campaign advertising.

Every commercial break contains at least one ad that starts with "I'm Barack Obama and I approve this message," and another that ends with, "I'm John Mccain and I approve this message." Obama sound authoritative, "I'M Barack Obama and I APPROVE this message," whereas McCain comes off rather matter-of-factly: "I'm John McCan and I approve this message." Sometimes the commercials run back-to-back, so it sounds like this: "I'm John McCain and I approve this message." "I'M Barack Obama and I APPROVE this message."

Now, see, when it comes to suffering the reprecussions of approving these sometimes less-than-factual messages, I think that Barack Obama has a better strategy. He approves the commercial before it even airs. I think that this is in case it turns out to be a total crock, he could always say, "Well, I had approved a different message, but then they played that one instead. I did not see that one coming." Whereas John McCain is sitting there in black-and-white with heroic lighting bathing him from the window, having heard the message we all just heard, and then he approves it. Later when reporters probe, "Senator McCain, we all know that Barack Obama did not vote for 'comprehensive sex education for kindergartners,' and that the same article quoted actually said that you didn't have an impressive education record, either. Did you really approve that message?" He has no choice. He has to say, "Actually, it is true that Obama voted for comprehensive sex education." This digs him deeper in a hole, which is why he should be approving those messages at the beginning of the ad, like Barack Obama, who I suspect is saving the I-didn't-see-that-ad-coming tactic for a real doozy.

Here is what I think. I think that if these two men (who worked together in the Senate to reform campaign finance) really want campaign finance to be reformed, and if they want an election to be won based on the issues, then they should get together for a grande latte and make a pinky-swear pact that they will not run any more commercials. Seriously. No one is becoming better educated by a 30 second commercial skewing the facts and then three days of talking about which parts exactly were "almost true" and which parts were "pants on fire" (a phrase that I read in USA Today which is still providing me with amusement).

This campaign advertisement business has been a supreme waste of my t.v. viewing time. Just buy some stage makeup and have a DEBATE already! (But remember not to buy that same blush that Al Gore wore. He looked like a pretty little girl. Just a peach-ish hue will do fine, gentlemen.) If campaigns were run on radio broadcasted debates and stump speeches (I mean real stumps, like find-a-cut-down-tree-and-stand-on-its-stump speech), I would be a happy voter. Of course, back when that was campaign strategy, I wouldn't have been allowed to vote. So I suppose I should be a little less picky.

My point is, television commercials are no place for real issues and hard truth, and we all know it. I mean, you don't see reporters asking the CEO of Cheese-Its, "Is it true that you really run over an entire city with a gigantic ball of cheese in order to get all of that cheese-y flavor into one little bite?"

The Story of Monday

There are some stories that need to be told, and some days that need to be preserved in memory. This is not that kind of story, and this past Monday was not that kind of day. But I'm going to tell it, regardless, because it was such an entirely useless day that I feel I need to put it to some kind of use, if not just as material to practice telling stories.

"The pizza should be out of the oven at 7:30," Pete said at 7:20 pm on Monday.

"You'll be out of the shower by then, no?" I asked. The apartment was stifling and I had no desire to go near the hot oven that had been 'preheating' for the entire hour that I had been at Target.

"Yeah, I should be out of the shower by then."

"Pete?" I asked.

"Yes?"

"I have a request. No, a demand." I sat on the bed, crossed my legs, and tossed the Target bag aside. "I demand that you play the High Society Music."

The High Society Music is a wonderful trick that I just discovered Pete can do. We had been watching the John Adams story, and Pete started "playing" along with the music in a party scene. He motioned like he was playing a little flute, then a little tiny mandolin of some sort, and a bunch of other instruments that I don't know the names of but always hear in the kinds of movies where men in wigs are dancing. Soon Pete started making noises like the instruments, and then his eyebrows raised really really high on his forehead, and it was just about the most fantastic spectacle I have ever seen: him humming and whistling and pantomiming about 10 instruments at once.

"I demand that you play the High Society Music," I said again. "Right. Now."

"Joooyyy," he groaned. "I'm not going to play the High Society music. I'm going to shower."

"No! Play it!"

Reluctantly he started playing a little air flute, then slowly added new instruments, until he was playing an unidentifiable brass instrument with a great amount of gusto. I laughed and laughed and laughed and rolled on the bed and laughed some more. Soon we were both laughing and being altogether silly, and a whole slew of inside jokes and bits started pouring out, until it was 7:30 and the pizza was ready.

Pete said, "Okay, go get the pizza. I'm going to shower."

"I don't want to get the pizza," I said. "Will you go get it before you jump in the shower?" He laughed, scurried into the bathroom and locked the door. I was instantly furious.

I knocked on the door and yelled over the noise of the shower, "I'm not getting the pizza! You said YOU would make the pizza! I always end up getting it out. I'm hot and I don't want to go near the oven."

I went back to sorting my Target items. 7:31. "I'M NOT GETTING THE PIZZA!"

7:32: "I told you, I'm NOT getting the PIZZA. It's BURNING!"

7:34: (Knock, pound, knock): "I told you, I'm not getting the PIZZZAAAA!!!"

I heard the shower turn off, and Pete said, "Wait. You mean the pizza is still in the oven?"

"Yes."

"You didn't get the pizza out of the oven?"

"No. I did not. Just as I've been telling you."

"Joy! I can't hear anything in the shower!" He got out of the shower, wrapped himself in a towel and went to get the burnt pizza out of the oven. "Thanks a lot," I heard him mutter as he stepped back into the shower.

By then I was feeling pretty stupid. But I still had my pride, unfortunately. So when Pete got out of the shower and asked, "Okay, now why didn't you get the pizza?" I was fully prepared to stand by my actions.

"Because I am hot, and the oven has been preheating for an hour. You said you would put in the pizza an hour ago. I came back from Target and it was thawed on the counter. You could have put it in the oven before you got in the shower, and I TOLD you that I wasn't going to do it. You got in the shower anyways, and I didn't take it out of the oven."

"So you let our dinner burn out of spite."

"Well, you ran into the bathroom even though you knew I didn't want to take it out. And I thought that was spiteful."

"Joy," he said patiently, as though I were four (which, at this point, could be logically argued), "Even if I were spite-ing you, why would you want to spite me?"

"Because, Pete. I'm not a better person than you. I'm just the same or worse."

At 9:00 pm on Monday I put a pan of brownie batter in the back of the car. I hadn't had time to bake them since we had made two frozen pizzas, but I would put them in our friend's oven and we'd have hot brownies halfway through the Heroes premiere. Pete got into the driver's seat and we made conversation as he turned out of our apartment complex, onto East Paris, and eventually onto 44th st. "Now," he said, "It's one of these little neighborhoods on the left."

"You have the address and directions, right?" I asked.

"No. I've been here before."

I took a deep breath. "Pete, we came here one time a year ago. It was daytime then. And we were coming from a different direction."

"Joy, it's fine. Well, it's not this one..." He turned back onto 44th st.

"Would you please call Joe?" I asked.

"I don't have my cell phone with me."

"Fine, I'll call." I looked through my purse, then remembered that i had changed jeans just before stepping out the door, and my cell phone was in the pockets. "So," I set out to clarify, "You are driving in the dark, depending on your memory from a year ago, and you didn't check to make sure you had your Blackberry with its nifty Mapquest feature that we are paying $30 a month for."

40 minutes later we pulled back into our driveway. The brownie batter had slid to one side of the pan. We walked up the stairs to our apartment and returned calls to let our friends know that we were alive. Barely.

"Well, what do you want to do?" Pete asked.

"I want to go to Family Video and get the next season of Seinfeld." So we went to Family Video, but they didn't have the next season of Seinfeld.

10:30, back at home, Pete presented me with my catalog that had come in the mail. He said, "You know what I think? I think that you should look through this catalog and get anything you want. And I'll pick up extra hours at work to pay for it. You work really hard and I'm sorry about tonight, and I want to do something to make you feel happy."

I leafed through the catalog at the wide-leg jeans that I've wanted and the winter coats and blouses, boots, cardigans.

"I'm sorry I let the pizza burn."

"I know."

"I really wish you would plan ahead with things."

"I know."

"I'll try to stear away from the $200 coats, even though they're really cute."

"I said 'anything,' Joy."

Softly, meekly: "Will you play the High Society music?"

"No, I'm going to bed." He started up the stairs.

"But I DEMAND it!"

Other People's Customers are Jerks, Too!

As Layla (a blogger friend I've acquired) would quote Eliane (of Seinfeld) in saying, "I'm the QUEEN of confrontation!" (Or did Seinfeld say that of Elaine? Help me out, Layla.)

Apparently I love confronting rude behavior so much, I am now seeking opportunities in society to confront OTHER people's customers. I don't know why I haven't thought of this before! I can say whatever I want to whomever I want, AND I don't have to worry about poorly reflecting my company.

I came to this delightful realization at the post office the other day, when I was waiting patiently to weigh and send my envelope. The man in front of me asked for a label to put on his envelope. The post woman said, "I'm sorry, Sir. I can give you a pen to write directly on your envelope, but I can't give you a label. The post office is making a lot of price cuts to keep postage as low as possible."

I thought: That is nice. I'm sick of postage going up. I'm glad they are doing all they can to keep it down. But the man in front of me said, "Well. You're really cheap, aren't you? I think that's really cheap of you to not give me a label. I've been getting labels at the post office for years."

The post woman said, "I'm sorry sir, but it's a mandate from the top. I can't give you a label, but I would be happy to lend you a pen to write directly on the envelope." (We all have to pause here and wonder: Who puts labels on their envelopes?)

I was visibly rolling my eyes and groaning at this point, hoping to make enough noise that he would turn around. But when he continued on, I interrupted.

"Excuse me, sir," I said. "She is not cheap. She is working for a company that is cutting costs." I said this before he even turned around, which he eventually did. He looked at me like I was crazy, even though he was the one asking for a label to put on an envelope.

"Did you say something?"

"Yes. She is not cheap. She is working for the government, and the government doesn't want to give you any more free labels."

This is when the gentleman glanced down... not to look at my chest (which would have been further reason to put him in his place), but to look at my name tag.

Joy Neal
Guest Services
Staybridge Suites Hotel

So the moral of the story is, if you don't want to reflect your company while out in public, take your name tag off.