Happiness.

I read a lot.  Avidly, some would say.  I won’t go into too much detail about the titles and genres I prefer to get lost in at this time, as it would give the people in my life  lots of new reasons to tease me. However, the scrambled thoughts behind this post are not to discuss books and my love for juvenile fantasy – whoops, there it is – but how curious it is that a book of that nature could challenge me so much.  As I recently re-read one of my favorite titles this summer, the words of the main character near the end of the story stood out to me more than in previous reads.  She says something along the lines of “You can never go back to a moment when you were truly happy.” Now, despite my love for the story as a whole, I find myself frustrated at how often I believe this thought to be true.  That my happiness is circumstantially defined and once a happy moment, or day, or weekend has passed, I can’t go back and feel it again.  And it makes me sad.  Too often do I walk away from those moments feeling hopeless instead of  delight.  Feeling gloom, instead of tenacious joy.  

Often when I have conversations with others regarding happiness, they always end up leading to discussions comparing it joy – all coming to a version of the conclusion that one feeling is a gift and the other a choice. Now, I recognize the need to choose joy at times when it may be difficult, and that doing so would change my attitude when faced with sadness. But that is not my focus here. It is in those fleeting, happy moments that I have found a challenge; one that manifests itself in the choice I have to see past the moment itself.  To look beyond towards the greater whole. 

As I’ve processed this over the last few weeks, a new understanding of  this  “greater whole” has begun to take shape in my mind.  When I reminisce of happy moments passed I should not focus on the reality that they ended, but that they were a taste of what is yet to come.  That such moments are only a glimpse, a snapshot if you will, of a great love taking hold of our lives.  The love of a Creator.

C.S. Lewis wrote in his work Till We Have Faces, "It was when I was happiest that I longed most...The sweetest thing in all my life has been the longing...to find the place where all the beauty came from."  I find myself drawn in by such a longing.  A desire to see and to know the source of all things good.  

My hope for myself and my challenge for you is that we will heed such a call.  That when we experience great moments of pure, unadulterated happiness we will recognize the beckon to something greater, and journey forward in hope seeking the One who called.  That such moments will not taste bittersweet in our mouths, but instead fill our lips with that tenacious joy I mentioned earlier.  For happy moments alone can not sustain us.  Only Christ can.  And He has many more snapshots to show us, and many more empty album pages to fill...

The Great Pie Adventure...

Today I have made a life-changing discovery… the short ,and rather catchy phrase “it’s as easy as pie” is a an absolute falsehood. That’s right - total bogus.  Pie is anything but easy.  In fact, pies suck.  Okay okay, so I may be letting my emotions get the best of me and warp my true feelings on the subject.  So really, all I can say honestly is that baking my first pie was definitely an adventure…

One would think that a delicious pocket of baked fruity goodness would be any easy and charming process. Not true. But I’m getting a little ahead of myself, so I will start at the beginning of amusing tale…  

[and if you are not getting a certain impression of me, yet I’ll make it very easy for you… I tend to exaggerate.]

The day started early, the sun’s light radiating great promise that the morning would be a grand one.  And it was.  Accompanied by friends and armed with  cash, we made our way to the Minneapolis Farmers Market – just north of 94 on Lyndale.  Our first plan of action was breakfast.  We quickly put our plan into motion by each purchasing a cinnamon roll the size of our face, and realized very quickly that eating your weight in frosting is not the classiest, nor the most comfortable way to begin your day. Though I will say, the free coffee I received from the gracious employee who informed me he was “getting so hammered tonight,” was definitely appreciated.  It was exceptionally good coffee.  Next, it was time to shop.  We had written out our lists of produce desires before our arrival, but that did not stop us from covering every inch of the market.  An hour later, we found ourselves laden down with numerous plastic bags containing everything from summer squash and purple carrots, to heirloom tomatoes and bundles of basil.  Among the other wonders of the farmers market, we also discovered a 54lb watermelon.  WHAAT?!  The owner of this monstrosity of a fruit informed us that his family had already consumed an even larger one earlier in the week.  Yikes.  Moving on past the ridiculously-large fruit tangent, our quest to the farmer's market ended well.  On the trek back to the car we eagerly discussed the rest of the days plans, and what we would create using our many new purchases. 

The Market Goers 

So here it is, the part of the story I know you have all been waiting to here about... the pie.  Among many other things, I purchased some lovely strawberries, peaches and rhubarb on the trip to the market.  I had very specific plans to use them to create a pie based on a recipe I found a few months ago.  Now when I say "based on" I do mean that quite literally, for the recipe I used for my pie adventure was more of my own creation - using ideas and measurements from a number of others.  Basically I winged it.  Anyway, after returning home from the market, I spent the rest of the morning prepping the kitchen and getting my wonderful fruit ready to fulfill their pie-filling destiny.  I then moved on to making the pie crust, and finally the crumble topping that would complete the picturesque pastry image forming in my mind.  As the crust chilled, I went to work on the filling, and it was there that my problems began.  Now, when it comes to baking, and you have decided to "wing it," things can get very janky very fast.  First my filling was to thin.  Then as I thickened it, by pre-cooking it on the stove, it was burning.  When it came time to pour it in the crust I had way less than I had planned.  Shoot.  And the crust was a challenge too.  As a college student with limited options, a fork became my pastry cutter and a plastic cup my rolling pin. And it kept falling apart! Gah. Now, none of these things may sound that bad to you.  You may even think I'm crazy.  And though you may be mostly right, I speak for all first-time pie bakers... it is SO much harder than it looks!  

Now despite the drama and unexpected twists to my baking adventure, there were definitely some highlights.  One of the redeeming factors, and also my favorite part of my pie took shape in foliage.  No lie.  I took half the dough I made and crafted it into individual pie-crust leaves, which I used to snazz-up the outer edge of the pie.  All the greatness is in the details.  

And here it is.  The finished product.  Full of blood, sweat and tears [though obviously not literally... yuck.]  

Ta-da!

As the Great Pie Adventure comes to an end, please take time to reflect and realize that the beginning of this story was much better than the end. Haha. Oh well. It's almost midnight and I am tired. Though I will finish with this...

...it was delicious.

My latest source of delight.

A record player.

Who would of thought that such an old and out of date machine could bring me so much joy?  This beautiful little trinket is the most recent find of one of my many garage sale adventures embarked on this summer.  The twenty-five greenbacks burning a hole in my pocket was a small price to pay for a door to hundreds of new [or rather old] musical possibilities.  In a wonderful vintage blue, accented by off-white tweed, this beauty has already found a home in my newly painted apartment [notice the breathtaking yellow background] , and is even roommate approved.

Records.  My new addiction.  Seriously though, I can't stop buying them.  My first purchases were simply based on cover-art and used to snazz-up my bedroom wall.  Now, as I have acquired the means with which to listen to them, I just can't seem to suppress the urge to buy more.  And now my roommates have caught the fever.  Our collection grows by the week, and having never paid more than $1 a record, I can't say any of us mind.  Though often times my purchases are still based on cover art, as I do not pretend to be any sort of music expert, the laughter that ensues while listening to the random records absolutely lessens the blow of my musical ignorance.  It's usually hilarious haha.  From Bob Dylan, to Ella Fitzgerald, to boot-stomping square dancing tunes, I never run out of things to listen to.  One of my personal favorites thus far is George Melachrino's Under Western Skies, an orchestral album for cowboys.  Complete with the clip-clopping sound of coconut horse hooves and the most beautiful arrangement of "Home on the Range" I've ever heard, it is guaranteed to transport you back to the wild west. Close your eyes while listening to this record, and it is much easier than one might expect to imagine oneself as Annie Oakley in another life.  I absolutely speak from experience haha.

Something new.

Here it is.  Post number one.  I have joined the ranks of thousands of other bloggers around the globe.  Bloggers who are motivated by the idea of dazzling their readers with eloquent prose, mouthwatering recipes and other tidbits of goodness they can't help but tell everyone about.  Now, I can't guarantee that the contents of my blog will overwhelm you with greatness.  I can't even guarantee that they will be grammatically correct.  Nonetheless, I'm going to press on and share with the general public things that I believe are worth knowing about.  If they catch your attention, great!  If they don't... agree to disagree.