i charge laughing

I am a self-proclaimed cynic (or realist, depending on my mood). I have an all too real view of how wicked and fallen the human race is. I involuntarily scowl sometimes at what I'm thinking or what someone else is saying. I enjoy watching tragic movies and listening to sad songs. I nod along with T.S. Eliot when he's at his lowest emotionally (April really is the cruelest month). Sometimes, I relish in what I consider my heightened understanding of the world. I'm not living under some kind of false sense of light and happiness.

I sound like an arrogant jerk, right? Well, it's because I am.

Okay, so I'm not like that all the time; I just kind of highlighted all of my cynical qualities at once. On good days, I see all the darkness and wickedness, but rejoice in the joy and good. I see people like paintings: I see God's brushstrokes and the colors and the painful scrapes of the painting knife, but I also feel I can see a glimpse of the final product. Because I'm outside of the painting looking in, I can get a sense of where God's heading with His creative license. And oh, it is so beautiful.

So I'm not a Debbie Downer all the time. While fake cheerfulness can irritate me, I appreciate genuine optimism.

But I'm realizing what my problem is: I start with the bad stuff and work to the good. That's how I've operated for the past several years, and I think it's hurt me more than protected me. Because, really, that's why I do it--protection.

The past couple weeks have been kind of stressful for me. Just lots of work due and not enough sleep. But then, this week, I've had the most amazing things happen. They're all small and seem insignificant, but they have done more to boost my spirits than anything else. On Wednesday, a friend just randomly bought me a doughnut and chocolate milk, which if you know me, you'd know just how much I'd love that. Last night, I went shopping with another friend, and we had some great conversation: deep, thought-provoking stuff. But then mixed in with that, we tried on ridiculous dresses, ate Italian street food, and just joked around. After that, I saw another friend of mine in a play, and we went and got coffee afterwards, being far too loud for such a small shop.

I just feel so blessed to have these friends. I know people say that a lot, but I really truly mean it. Last year, I didn't have that many friends at Cedarville. Maybe 1 1/2. I felt isolated, and I frequently second-guessed my choice of coming to college. But now. I have these amazing people surrounding me; every single one of them is different and add to my life in incredible ways.

What right have I to start with the bad when there's so much good?

It's funny because I started writing this blog post this morning during a lull in activity at work. Since then, I've gotten a card from my mom. Here's a little bit of what she said to me.

Remember, one day, one step at a time. God's grace is sufficient for today.... In the midst of your busyness and stress of this semester, keep a sharp eye out for your little blessings like a Mr. Robin [my mom loves birds], or an Olaf [she also loves Frozen], or a tiny flower, or some entertaining campus golf [I narrated a game to her this past Saturday]. Be sure to just stop now and then, breathe, look around you, and thank God for the little blessings.

Isn't my mom the greatest? The correct answer is "yes."

It's always the little things that matter. I can lose sight of that being a big picture, future-oriented, cynic kinda gal. I have to pay attention to the details. Step by step I'll get to where God wants. The big stuff will only come after the little.

Which leads to another funny story. After I read that card and booted up the computer to finish this blogpost, an e-mail was waiting for me. It was the director of the study abroad program in Oxford; I got an interview with him tomorrow.

The big stuff came after the little stuff. My heart was already bubbling with warmth and contentment because I turned my eyes away from the stress and darkness of the future and focused on the little blessings in my life.

So, enough of early Modernist T.S. Eliot. So what if April's the cruelest month? In response to Eliot's depressing and empty view on life, E.E. Cummings wrote his poem "[into the strenuous briefness]." Cummings was naturally optimistic and resisted the hopelessness of his fellow Modern poets.

into the strenuous briefness

Life:

handorgans and April

darkness,friends

i charge laughing.

Though there's April and darkness, don't forget the handorgans and friends. Life is hard and brief, but it is also good. Focus on the good: and charge laughing. 

What's in a Name?

Forgive me for the frightfully unoriginal title. I wish I had my dad's gift of naming things: he's pretty witty and clever when it comes to quick quips and flashy titles.

I suppose the inability to name things is the point of this blog post.
(I actually don't know what the point of this blog post is. I never know. If I say I do, I'm lying. I'm a big proponent of the "fake it 'til you make it" mentality.)

So my name. My name (as you undoubtedly know) is Alexis Faith Ancona. Nothing super complicated. My parents didn't insist on spelling my name Ehleksis (lookin' at you, Xavier) and though my last name elicits inevitable snake jokes from virtually everyone I meet (including that stranger at an away game in Portland that one time. Dude, I don't even know you. Please don't laugh and tell me my last name is one vowel and one consonant away from being "Anaconda." I promise you I'm already aware of that), "Ancona" really isn't that complicated either.

What I'd like to know, then, is why so many people either forget or mispronounce my name. I suppose it's not so much mispronouncing as it is just calling me something that's not my name (ie. Alex, Alexa, Alexi). It's a frequent occurrence in my life, and it makes me unreasonably angry. (I said unreasonably so you would know I'm self-aware that I shouldn't be so bothered by this, but I am.)

When I was eight (nine? ten? seven? I was little), I had a friend named McKayla (I don't know if that's how she spelled her name. Why can't we agree on one spelling for different names?). McKayla and I hung out a lot: every Sunday after church, in fact. We went to summer camp together one year, played Frogger, got in arguments about bikinis, and ate a ridiculous amount of humus. I knew her for quite a while--probably two or three years (before she moved to the south. I've lost a crazy amount of friends to the south).

During the whole time I knew her, she always called me Alexa. I never corrected her because I didn't want to upset her. I had it in my head that if I told her my name was "AlexIS" not "AlexA" (you should definitely read that in Hermione Granger's snottiest know-it-all voice), I would come across as snooty. Then it just got to the point where it would simply be awkward if I corrected her. "We've known each other for six months, and you're just NOW telling me I've been saying your name wrong?" So I didn't.

When I was thirteen, I went to Canada to work at camp, all my campers called me "Alex." I guess those extra two letters were just hard to remember.

My youth leader at Shiloh Chapel only remembered my name after turning it into a mnemonic device. "Alex is..." and he would fill in the blank. It became a running joke at youth group. Whenever anyone said it, though, I always filled it in with "Alex is...not my name." or "Alex is...a dumb name" (sorry to all you Alex-es [how do you plural a name??] out there. I was a bitter twelve-year-old).

My first semester of college, I went to virtually all bro-sis events, hung out with my brother hall, tried to be super social and step out of my comfort zone and whatever, and at the end of the semester during a Christmas party, my brother RA called me "Rachel." (which, oddly enough, is a name people call me a lot. I guess I just have a Rachel face)

There's a girl in my Advanced Composition class who I've known since freshman year who still calls me "Alexa" regardless of the half a dozen times I've told her my name's Alexis.

The point of all these stories, I guess, is to communicate that this is a surprisingly frequent issue in my life. I've tried to pass it off as people being bad with names, but I've always thought that was a poor excuse. My good friend* The Office writer/actress Mindy Kaling affirmed my suspicions in her book Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me?:

I don't think it should be socially acceptable for people to say they are "bad with names." No one is bad with names. That is not a real thing. Not knowing people's names isn't a neurological condition; it's a choice. You choose not to make learning people's names a priority. It's like saying, "Hey, a disclaimer about me: I'm rude."**

I just feel names are really important. I always took mine to heart. I had one of those bookmarks you get from Christian bookstores that tells you the meaning of your name and has a Bible verse on it. According to this bookmark, "Alexis" means "helper of mankind." I took that really seriously growing up. One time, I accidentally took a card game home from school, and I cried for an hour in my room because I had stolen something and did the opposite of what my name meant.

I remember watching an episode of the old Tarzan TV series and there was a bad guy named Alexis. That's when I found it that it's a boys' name in Russia. I've also been unreasonably proud of that ever since.

It makes me feel really, REALLY good about myself when someone uses my name when talking to me. I don't mean a creepy amount of times like at the beginning and end of each sentence, but like, "You look nice today, Alexis." or "Hey! How are you doing, Alexis?" Things like that. It just makes it special.

This is a pretty long blog post, but I promise I'm almost done.***

In Genesis, God commanded Adam to name all the animals. I've always taken that to imply that names are super important. Some of my favourite studies in devotions and chapels and sermons were on the names of God. He's just really good at coming up with names. I mean, telling Moses He is "I Am" is a great way of communicating His identity. He is. I feel like it's a way of saying He Is Everything. He Is All That Matters.

And that's what it comes down to, I guess. Names communicate identity. You read all kinds of mythology and fantasy about the power of a name. That's why God calls His people "by name." He's not just calling to people in general, but has called each of us individually, especially, lovingly by name. When given a name, we're no longer part of the masses, a blur in a sea of faces, we become individual. We were deemed important enough to have a name.

So I guess my plea is don't forget that. Don't forget all the people you see have names. And if you want to make someone happy, learn theirs, and don't forget it.

I see the city lights all around me. Everyone's obscure; ten million people each with their problems. Why should anyone care? And in Your eyes I can see: I am not just a man, vastly lost in this world. Lost in a sea of faces. Your body's the bread, Your blood is the wine because You traded Your life for mine. -Kutless, "Sea of Faces" 

 *(For legal reasons, I have to tell you that I actually do not know Mindy Kaling personally, though I wish I did.)
**(I should make my own disclaimer that I also have used the excuse "I'm bad with names." I apologize. Sometimes, I can be a bad person.)
***(I wasn't actually almost done.)

A final note: Don't worry if you forget my name. I won't actually freak out. Also: I'm a fan of nicknames and I do have some friends who call me "Lex," "Lexi," and my brothers call me "Lu." The instances to which I refer in this post are when people simply don't know my actual name.

Do You Want to Build a Snowman?

The way I see it, every life is a pile of good things and bad things. The good things don't always soften the bad things, but vice-versa, the bad things don't necessarily spoil the good things or make them unimportant. -Doctor Who

Okay, I know I've probably put some people off with a Doctor Who quote, but bear with me. (Also: there are more references to come. Can't help it. I'm a nerd.)

I'm late for chapel every day. This semester, I took a job as a chapel scanner. This means I get paid two dollars an hour, stand in a doorway, and press a button on a little machine to scan people's ID cards. It's pretty great, actually. I basically get paid to be social. Anyhow, because of this, I have to wait until 10:05 (chapel starts at 10:00) to make sure everyone gets in, and then I go sit down.

Today, however, I was fifteen minutes late.

There are typically two scanners for each doorway, which means that I get to hang out with my friend Dan while working, too. As we were returning to the main lobby (we stand at one of the side doors) to replace our scanners, we looked outside and saw (quite literally) a winter wonderland.

The snowflakes were as big as my nose! They drifted slowly and beautifully down from the sky. It looked just like the closing scene to White Christmas (without the fake sound-stage, as Dan pointed out). Unable to contain my excitement, I declared that I MUST catch at least one snowflake on my tongue before going to chapel. Dan enthusiastically joined me. I forgot that I wasn't wearing a coat or boots or anything of the sort, and ran outside.

We instantly started laughing. I stuck my tongue out, outbursts of laughter still coming from the back of my throat. We were spinning and blinking in the pure whiteness.

I haven't laughed so much and so genuinely in a long time. I barely felt the cold even though my little dress flats were soaked and my forearms were exposed to the blizzard. I was so utterly amazed at God's gorgeous creation. I felt so blessed.

Suddenly, intense childlike joy consumed me as the snowflakes melted on my tongue and--in true Sound of Music fashion--clung to my eyelashes. Compelled with this new-found joy, I threw my stuff on the ground and started making a snowman. Dan was also apparently struck with the urge, and we both began work on our mini frosty friends.

I was reminded of one time when Evan and I went on a walk with our Nana through her neighborhood in the winter. Ev reached down and grabbed some snow. I shrieked, thinking that a snowball to the face was imminent, but he just reached down and grabbed more snow. He told me he was making a mini snowman. So as we walked, we just started producing little snow people, leaving them sitting in snowbanks along the road. It's one of my favourite memories with him.

So Dan and I tore little branches and berries from a little tree next to the lake. I stuck the berries on as buttons, their holiday red contrasting the stark pure white of the snow. Dan smashed his berries on his snowman's head, attempting to give him eyes.

We bursted out laughing at his creepy snowman, our freezing fingers, and the sheer happiness of it all. We took pictures, expressed how excited we were this happened, and parted ways.

I swiftly gathered my typically-college travel mug and my discarded coat, and ran up the steps into the DMC. I was hoping to get into chapel before I was TOO late.

The thing is, the floor in the main lobby outside the chapel is marble. I was wearing wet dress flats. Plus, I'm me. So, you know, I of course fell spectacularly, rolling my ankle (hearing the familiar pop) and slamming my left hip against the floor.

There were a few people sitting in the lobby. They all looked up suddenly, mild concern on their faces.

I, however, just started laughing hysterically.

I wasn't embarrassed, I didn't care about the bruise already forming on my hip, or my mild ankle sprain (that's just commonplace now, honestly). As I laughed and choked out rushed sorries to no one and everyone, one girl shook her head disapprovingly, turning back to her book.

I felt a lot like (NERD ALERT) Bilbo Baggins running through the Shire. In the book, Tolkien does this great thing where he describes all the disapproving Hobbits shaking their heads and muttering about Bilbo's craziness. But did Bilbo care? Of course not, he's part Took (sorry, that was extra nerdy)! He proudly shouted, "I'm going on an adventure!"

For once in my life, I didn't care what they were thinking. I was so filled with what I know was God-given joy. Some of you probably think I'm ridiculous for getting so much out of a little snowman, but that's how God works, you know? He knew I needed some childhood joy and a friend to laugh with.

I guess I don't know exactly where this is going, but back to the Doctor Who quote for a moment. After all that fun outside, I went in and immediately (and literally) crashed into the hard ground. Though I was actually in a lot of pain (and still am--I limped all the way to work), I was just so happy, I didn't care. Bad things come and go, but so do the good. It's your choice whether you focus on your pile of bad or your pile of good.

Right now, I don't really know what my future holds. I'm kind of terrified about this semester (and the future in general). I don't know what's going to happen. I've had a lot of bad things occur over the past few years.

But my choice? I'm not listening to the scoffs, looking at the shaking heads, obsessing over the unknown, disregarding joy--no matter what form it takes.

Me? I'm going to focus on the good.