Everyday Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving morning two years ago, I discovered that Juliana's room was being overrun with mold.  I spent a day furiously scrubbing and bleaching and moving furniture. The next day I painfully sprained my ankle and hobbled on crutches to our Thanksgiving celebration (down 6 flights of stairs, up 5, down 5, up 6... it was tricky, but I was determined to make it to the turkey!)

Thanksgiving morning one year ago, I spent in my parent's warm, turkey-scented kitchen while my mom and sisters scurried around making voluminous amounts of traditional foods.  I made a chocolate salted caramel pecan pie because...we were in America and Americans do that kind of thing.  It was my first Thanksgiving with my family in 9 years, and I loved all the traditional foods and all the traditional people, plus a handful of new children!

This year I am looking forward to celebrating Thanksgiving with the other teams in our province.  Thanksgiving Day itself probably won't be anything out of the ordinary, but this year I am delighting in thankfulness.  If I could go back and re-choose my "one word" for the year, it might be gratitude. It's not that I have been amazingly grateful all year, but it may be the most important lesson I have been learning throughout the year.

Actually I spent the first part of the year stewing in discontent.  I was stressed with the thought of all the changes coming up as we ended our time in the States.  I was frustrated that months after moving back to China, settling into our new apartment and school and teaching positions, I still felt so unsettled!

I pushed against the constraints of mothering; planning my life around naps and nursing, telling my stubborn 3 year old the Same Things every other minute of every single day.  I looked longingly at other people's lives and was frustrated that mine didn't seem to be working as well as theirs.  I stewed over the days filled with endless, seemingly empty tasks.  Laundry and more laundry and didn't I just cook last night and now people expect to eat again?  Shouldn't life be more meaningful?  Where was the Important work I was supposed to be doing?

There were many happy moments as well, as my baby's first year flew by, and as my 3-year old occasionally broke out of her "I rule the world" delusion, but often I just dreamed about getting away.  When I read back over my occasionally-kept journal, I see themes of discontent spring up everywhere.  I was exhausted from discontent.  Also from not sleeping, but discontent emptied my soul every day.

This summer I came across Ann Voskamp's book 1000 Gifts.  I had been hearing about it but started reading a bit skeptically because the writing seemed rather flowery.  I discovered I not only found the writing beautiful (although it was flowery and I did do some skimming), I also loved what she had to say.  There are many times I have read an inspiring book, but soon after I finish reading the inspiration fades.  What I appreciated about this book is that it introduced a practice, a very simple habit of developing gratitude.  While I've forgotten most of Ann's wise, quotable sayings, I have made the practice my own.

Ann Voskamp talked about her experience with keeping a gratitude journal, simply noticing and writing down the small, everyday beauties.  I started keeping my own gratitude journal, but after a few weeks I never remembered to write things down.  However, I have continued noticing.  And in noticing, I have realized how much beauty there is in the most simple things.

The scent of baking bread.
The warm sun caught in the prism, throwing rainbows across the floor.
The soft, warm cheek of a just-woken baby.
The silly words of a stubborn 4 year old.
The feeling of satisfaction over a momentarily clean floor or empty laundry basket.
The way my student's eyes shine as we discuss important things.

I still grumble and take things for granted and notice the ugly, dull, and unpleasant parts of life.  But I make much greater effort to stop and absorb the beautiful moments.  When I see a colorful sunset, I force myself to stop and drink it in instead of rushing off to accomplish something.  I have become a seeker of beauty.  On the days when I am feeling crabby and ungrateful, I look even harder.  I always find something.

My life has changed somewhat since the spring.  We are more settled.  I am getting better sleep.  Four-years-old has been easier than three.  But mostly what has changed is not my life but my eyes.  I see the depressingly old, rusted windows, but I also see the sun reflecting brilliantly in them.  The beauty is there; we just have to open our eyes and see it.

"We don't have to change what we see.  Only the way we see." - Ann Voskamp

[Linking up with Velvet Ashes today]

On Gratitude and Growing Green Stuff

This Thanksgiving Day was not the greatest.  We weren't planning to celebrate until the weekend, since we still had class on Thursday, but it still seemed like the day should be a little special, since it was actual Thanksgiving.  I thought maybe I could at least do a little Thanksgiving craft with Juliana.

I picked up a few things around the house and was emptying the trash in Juliana's room when I saw it.  Nasty growing green stuff.  My eyes traveled along the edge of Juliana's windowsill and everywhere I looked the mold was sprouting up again. 

The window in her room is already not the best part of the house – the ridiculously thin inner windows aren't enough to keep out the cold and the landlord is unwilling to fix the broken outer windows, so we constructed our own window replacements with old window screens, thick plastic, tape, some wooden supports, and yes, chopsticks.  The room has been much warmer, but every day the windows cover with condensation...water which drips down into the old windowsill boards.  We re-varnished the boards a few months ago, but they are so cracked and warped that the moisture keeps soaking through,  The radiator is directly underneath the window, so we have our own mold breeding ground.  And it was certainly breeding again.

On Thanksgiving morning as I stood looking at the mold I felt frustrated and defeated.  I was pretty sure that no matter what we did, the mold would just come back.  Suddenly our apartment felt like a giant, toxic mold breeding factory.  The bathroom has no ventilation and is covered with water every time we shower, so it molds.  In the wintertime all the windows cover with condensation (or ice, when it's cold enough), and all the radiators are directly under the windowsills.  Even the kitchen windowsill, which is tile and generally stays pretty cold, manages to produce mold.  Our stupid little stove alcove is almost impossible to keep clean, so in the wintertime it forms frozen mold!

I grabbed my vinegar (the strongest cleaning supply I have around right now) and scoured Juliana's windowsill and then moved on to attack the kitchen.  As I cleaned I thought about what we could do.  Move!!  No, not really.  We have no place to move to, and anyway have already paid rent through July.  But this would mean we'd need to move Juliana out of her room.

Juliana has been coughing for the last two months.  I don't know if the mold is the cause, but I know it's not helping.  When I took her to the doctor the other day he said he though she had an infection and gave her antibiotics.  I hope it is an infection.  I would like it to be that easy to clear up!  But I know doctors like to give antibiotics for just about everything here, so I remain a bit skeptical.  Besides, if you only have to pay 60 cents to see the doctor, doesn't that make you a little leery of their medical advice?

As I spent my Thanksgiving morning cleaning up mold, I did not feel grateful.  I felt frustrated and overwhelmed and angry.  The kind of angry that spreads from one specific area to encompass every wrong recently experienced.

I was angry with this old building that is a mold machine.  I was angry with Chinese builders for not making better buildings that wouldn't turn into mold machines.  I was angry at the landlord for not having higher standards.

I was angry at the doctor for prescribing Juliana medicine that was banned in the US because of possible liver damage.  It's probably the third or fourth time that's happened to us.  I was angry at the whole Chinese medical system.

I was angry with all the people who keep telling us that Juliana is coughing because she's not wearing enough clothes or not drinking enough warm water or that we would dream of giving her cold milk and yogurt.  Doesn't anyone understand germs – and mold?

I was angry at the roaches who have taken us up on the “our home is your home” mentality though I'm quite sure we never extended that invitation.

Of course mold and roaches and poor construction and well-intentioned advice can happen in any country, but somehow this all seemed like CHINA'S FAULT.  This is what we call a “bad China day,” and I hadn't had one of those in a long time.

So here it was Thanksgiving and I was feeling less grateful than I had all year.  I knew I should feel grateful, but that wasn't helping.  Even in the midst of my terrible mood I could recognize that old familiar feeling: entitlement.

It's not enough to have a warm, mostly comfortable home nicer than most people in the world – one large enough that we had another room to move Juliana into – I want a better house.  It's not enough to have medical care when many people have none – I want the standard I am used to.  It's not enough to be surrounded by caring people who are concerned about Juliana – I want their concern to be scientifically accurate!  All these expectations seem entirely reasonable because I am American.  If I just lived in America I could have all these things (more or less), so even though I choose to live outside America I still feel like it is my due.

I can't think of much that is less conducive to gratitude than a sense of entitlement.  It’s pretty ugly, but I find it creeping in much more often than I would like.  For some reason it’s so much easier to recognize the things you don’t have.  This summer we heard several messages related to gratitude and generosity that have been on my mind ever since.  Erwin McManus said, “It is a life of gratitude that makes us whole, overwhelms us with love and moves us to live generous lives."  I really do think that gratitude and generosity are intimately linked.  When we become so busy looking at the small lacks in our own lives, we lose sight of the genuine needs of others.  Entitlement leads to bitterness and stinginess.  Gratitude leads to joy and generosity.

So I’m still working on the generosity thing, trying to keep my small problems, like mold, in perspective.  It may not be ideal or good for our health, but it’s not going to kill us like starvation or unclean water.  I may have spent the day cleaning up mold and rearranging the house, but I have a whole lot to be thankful for.  Like thankfully we got the house moved around before I sprained my ankle! :)