Moving On

Tonight, our apartment is full of boxes. Our drawers are empty, our bookcases are clear, and our closets are bare. Tomorrow, we are moving to a new place in a different town and leaving our first apartment behind.

I always told Mitchell I didn't want to live in Watertown, so, naturally, we ended up living in Watertown. Having lived there as long as I could remember, I felt it was time for me to move on to a larger, more sophisticated town, preferably one with a Target or at least one nice restaurant where we could have date nights. About six weeks before our wedding, however, I realized that, since the only firm plan we had for the fall was Mitchell's student teaching in Watertown, we had better plan to live in Watertown.

But with three weeks to go before we got married, we still hadn't found an apartment. Because we had no renting history and no idea what kind of income we could expect in the fall, our options were woefully limited.

When we mentioned to our Sunday school class that we were still looking for a place to live, a lady in the class suggested we call her brother-in-law, who had an upper apartment that had been vacant for months. From the moment we stepped inside that last Sunday afternoon in June, we knew we had found the right place. With its low ceilings, it felt like a hobbit hole, the perfect size for two people under 5'6". And it was furnished and it was the least expensive place we'd looked at. Two days later, we signed our lease.

It didn't take long to move in; we didn't have much stuff. We owned a coffee table, a bookcase, a chair, a bed frame, and a dresser––all gifts or hand-me-downs. But thanks to my bridal shower and the wedding gifts that trickled in over the course of our first month or so of marriage, we had everything we needed and most of what we wanted, too.

Nearly all of those lovely things are packed away now, awaiting their new home. The apartment looks strange without them, and it feels even stranger to know this is my last night in the place where we spent our first two years as newlyweds.

I am bad at change but excellent at nostalgia. This last week memories have been drifting in and out of my mind, reminding me of all the moments we have spent in our hobbit hole. After our wedding reception, we slow-danced in the living room to "Extraordinary Magic" by Ben Rector, and I cried on the couch when we opened our cards. The next morning, we ate cold rehearsal dinner pizza at the kitchen table before embarking on our honeymoon. For our first real dinner in the apartment, I made pasta with fresh green beans. After we had been married for a month, Mitchell bought me a vanity so I wouldn't have to stand in front of the mirror on our bedroom wall to do my makeup. Today we found that mirror tucked in one of our closets; I had forgotten about it.

I remember Mitchell jamming to Panic! at the Disco while washing dishes, trying to make his most hated chore bearable. I remember hanging our floral shower curtain and being amazed at how much cheerier the room seemed with it up. I remember finding Mitchell asleep on the laminate floor in front of the AC unit in our kitchen window one night. I remember rearranging our living room one Wednesday because he was curious. I remember bringing home the first piece of furniture we had purchased together: an IKEA desk, which did not have a desk chair until nearly a full year later. I remember putting our futon mattress on the floor so we could watch The Office, eat pizza, and fall asleep at 7:30 one Friday night.

Ironically, I began to realize that I no longer hated living in Watertown. It became almost comforting to be in a place where I knew what was going on and felt known myself. Nothing makes you feel like you belong somewhere quite like the guy at your favorite pizza place grabbing your order for you as soon as you walk in, even though there's a line. And now, just as I have come to love where I live, we are leaving.

"We've had a good run in this place," Mitchell told me tonight as we finished packing up the spare room. And we have. Like all first apartments, it has had its quirks––no overhead lighting, a smoke detector that goes off at the first whiff of hot oil. But there has been so much to love as well: the hutch big enough to store my pots and pans, the beautiful sink installed a few months into our tenancy, the huge shelves built into our closet. As far as first apartments go, we can't imagine a better place to have begun our life together.

I am not looking forward to loading up the moving truck or locking the door behind me for the last time. But it will be good to have a dishwasher. And laundry facilities. And a three-minute commute for Mitchell instead of a thirty-minute one. I will learn the layout of our new city and figure out where to put all my stuff. We will probably buy more furniture. And we will look back fondly on this little hobbit hole of an apartment, this place that has been a tangible reminder of God's many gifts to us and of the perfect timing of His provision. We are grateful to have stayed. We are grateful to be moving on.

Monthly Review: May

May has always been a special month in my life. For me, it's always been a time of celebrating––birthdays in my family, graduations, anniversaries––and this year, spring itself felt like a celebration, unbelievably beautiful in the daily changes of emerging life. With the school year drawing to a close and the calendar year nearly half over, May offers opportunities for reflection as well. They are not as fun as the celebrations, but they are, I believe, more necessary.

We come to the end of the month having experienced profound corporate losses. Some of those losses are of temporal things, but the ones we ought to mourn are those of eternal souls––precious individuals made in the image of God who are dead as a result of the pandemic and the violent injustice that has been a part of American society for longer than many of us would like to admit. It is right and good for us to grieve these losses.

"What a time to be alive," my husband commented this afternoon.

"I don't like it," I said. And I don't––everything seems so horribly sad and wrong in this world. Yet I continually return to the truth that all will be well in the world to come. Justice will be served. Unity will be achieved. Death itself will die. Until that happens, we are called to love God and our neighbor, particularly those neighbors who are in need.

In a world that has become increasingly strange and scary for many of us in 2020, we can often feel lost, as though we don't know what to do. We do not want to ignore or minimize suffering, nor do we want to wallow in it. Amidst such times, it is healthy to participate in small everyday tasks that bring us joy. For me, as you know, those tasks include making food for the people I love, reading great books, and taking the time to write. This is how I did that in the month of May.

What I Read

• Teaching with Love and Logic, Jim Fay and David Funk (★★★★★)

• Culture Making: Recovering Our Creative Calling, Andy Crouch (★★★★★)

• Lila, Marilynne Robinson (★★)

If you want to hear the rationale behind my rating, head to my Goodreads for full reviews.

What I Cooked

• Broccoli, Cheddar and Wild Rice Casserole

My mom used to make a chicken broccoli casserole when I was growing up, despite the criticisms of my brothers and me. Although I believe eventually we all came to grudgingly accept it, it hasn't been one of those recipes I've carried with me into my own kitchen. This broccoli and rice casserole, however, is one I can definitely see becoming a go-to. It's simple yet hearty, and it doesn't have any weird ingredients in it (cream of chicken soup, I'm looking at you). I do think it was a touch fussy (anything that involves 3 separate pans automatically loses a few points in my book), but worth the effort of cleaning up after it.

• Mexican Corn Salad

The men in my life (specifically, my husband and brother) inform me that this doesn't count as a salad because it's just corn. Be that as it may, it was so good that I made it twice this month, once to accompany my mom's birthday enchiladas and once to go with shrimp tacos for the two of us. Pro tip: use chipotle chili powder for a smoky touch of spiciness.

• Jalapeño Popper Chicken Skillet

I love a good one-pan meal, and this seemed like an exciting new one to try. I was afraid it would be too spicy, but actually, the flavor was quite mild for something with 4 jalapeños in it. If I make it again (which I probably will), I will add cayenne pepper and paprika to give it more of a kick. It didn't reheat super well, so it's best for a meal where you're serving enough people to not have a lot of leftovers.

• Sheet Pan Honey Balsamic Chicken and Brussels Sprouts

Sheet pan dinners are among my favorite because they're stupidly easy and almost always delicious. I subbed boneless skinless chicken thighs for the chicken breasts and served it over polenta. Would do again.

• Strawberry Summer Sheet Cake

This recipe happened to pop up on my Instagram feed a few days before our family Memorial Day picnic, so I decided to give it a try. It went over really well with my family, and I was tremendously impressed with how incredibly fluffy and light the cake was. If I were to make it again, however, I would change a few things. First, I would chop up 1/3 to 1/2 of the strawberries and fold them into the batter so they were incorporated throughout instead of being piled on top. Second, I would add some lemon zest to the sugar sprinkled over the strawberries, a move which would give the cake a bit more zing to counter its sweetness. I also think that subbing the strawberries for fresh cherries and adding some almond extract would be a delicious variation.

What I Created

• Unpublished original poem "Distance"

• Article "Dear Coronabride"

• "This I Will Remember" essay for the A Time Remembered essay contest sponsored by my favorite local bookstore (the contest is open until June 15, so make a submission if you can!)

• Blackout poem "Leaving the Porch Light On"

June is going to be a busy month for us. I've returned to work in a limited capacity, taken on a temporary position as a writer and editor for my alma mater, and started summer classes, and I'll have all of those things going on this month as we move into a new apartment (more on that to come). No matter how busy I get, though, I want to continue making space for weeping with those who mourn and reflecting on how I can make my corner of the world a place where people feel loved and valued.

Dear Coronabride

When you start planning your wedding, one of your primary responsibilities as the bride is to think about everything that could go wrong and come up with a plan to fix it. I’m sure you have done exactly that, mentally troubleshooting potential disasters at each point in the timeline for your wedding day. What if it rains? What if the best man loses the ring? What if a zealous aunt blocks the photographer’s view of the bridal entrance in her eagerness to capture the moment on her iPhone?

But in all your planning and preparing, it never occurred to you to plan for this. When you first set your date, you couldn’t have known that once you got this close to it, you would be having to worry whether your loved ones would stay healthy enough to travel or whether governmental restrictions would even allow them all to gather in one place to celebrate with you. Yet here you are in the midst of circumstances that would have seemed impossible only months ago, trying to figure out how to make this one day, this day you’ve dreamed of for years, possible.

You’re disappointed, and rightfully so. This isn’t your first or last encounter with disappointment, although it may be the most significant one you’ve dealt with so far. Even as you grieve the loss of the wedding day you’d hoped for, you are having to figure out how to move forward with plan B and the many complex logistics involved: communicating your changed plans to your guests, negotiating with vendors, and brainstorming additional contingency plans in case restrictions are extended. You have tough decisions to make, and I’m so sorry you’re having to make them.

When you’re in the midst of such an emotional situation, it’s hard to know what to think. Yet if you lose sight of why you’re getting married and what a wedding is supposed to be in the first place, your thoughts will grow even more scattered, unable to be collected. Now more than ever, you have to ground yourself in an accurate understanding of what a wedding is.

For as pretty and special as the details of a wedding are, they are not what makes a wedding legitimate. At the end of the day, you don’t need much for a wedding—look at the very first one in history. There was no white dress, no lengthy guest list, no lavish reception. But there was a man, a woman, and a covenant made before an authority who stood witness to the union, and so they had all they needed. Chances are, no matter where you live, you too have access to these essentials: your groom, your promises to one another, and someone to help you make it official. Truly, that is all your wedding needs.

Beginning your married life in this way that is so contrary to what you had planned certainly isn’t ideal, but experience tells me that reality often defies the ideal. In your marriage, you will often find that life doesn’t follow your plans. Yet it is in the unexpected moments that you can experience profound growth as a couple, and it is there that you can often find great joy as well. This wedding, whenever and however it happens, may well be such a time for you and your soon-to-be husband.

I don’t know your situation, so I can’t tell you what to do, even if you wish someone could make the decision for you. If my mom, who got married thirty years ago this June, could give you advice, she’d tell you to go to the preacher’s office and get married on the date you’ve been planning for, and then have your party when it’s safe for everyone to celebrate together, whether that be later this year or sometime in 2021.

Your wedding won’t look the way you pictured when you first sent out those save-the-dates, but that doesn’t mean it won’t be a real wedding. You will be entering into a lifelong covenant before God with the one you love as you stand before your officiant and say your vows, and this, the fact that you are beginning your story as husband and wife, is what will make your wedding beautiful. It doesn’t matter if you get married in the living room with only your parents and your officiant or whether you get married next summer in your dream venue. However you choose to adjust your plans, your wedding day will be special. I hope you will find great joy as well as you take the love of your life to be your husband, to have and to hold for richer or for poorer, in health and Coronavirus alike.