#micah6.8: the end we have come to

I can be way too perfectionistic in my writing. It’s why it takes me a long while to write these posts. It’s why I don’t post as often as I used to.

But it’s something I’m trying to overcome by doing more of these “rambles”, or setting time limits of “Vivienne you have 1 hour between now and when you have to talk to your mom and you are going to get your thoughts out before this, whether you like them or not”.

So, here I am on a Sunday night at 6:50p.m. armed with a cup of barley tea, LANY’s “Malibu Nights” on the background (can’t get enough of this song),  determined to end this series. 

I think back to when I first started this series back in July of last year. At that point, I hadn’t even met the person I am now engaged to. Crazy stuff. 

I started it wanting to discover how my faith influences my everyday, how belief permeates into the cracks of my thinking and how that differed for each person. 

The journey started with a reflection on food. I had started brainstorming ideas before I left for my Italy Alta Via hiking trip, and finished it atop a bunk bed of a crammed motel in Lblujana, Slovenia.

Beauty was a harder one. I would often end catch-ups with my friends with “hey, do you mind if I ask you a question about a blog post I’m writing?” I would then proceed to pick their brain on what they thought beauty was.

Often, the many varied responses left me more unsure about what to write about, but it often led to cool, meaningful conversations and perhaps that was the whole point in the end.

I wrote the beauty post over the many weekends I had alone in Strasbourg, curled up in a corner of a tea salon with a flaky croissant while waiters bustled about wondering why I had a computer open in a cafe (apparently I was violating many European culture rules by “working” in a place of socialization…oh well XD).

I so enjoyed being able to pick the brains of my friends for the beauty post that for the next post on work, I drafted up a formal set of questions and sent it to one representative for each of the work categories I had written up: entrepreneur, teacher, doctor and the list went on.

4 months of compiling and mulling later, the pandemic had happened, we were stuck solidly at home and I wrote the piece on work as it seemed like everyone in the world was wondering how their work was meaningful now that it was so different from what we had been used to. 

My posts then seemed to take on a mind of their own and the next one turned into a small research project of sorts. You know, as I was at home and not able to do “actual” research in the lab.

I surveyed 70 of my friends and published graphs that described the dating app usage/satisfaction of the respondents. A lot of them were frustrated at the lack of dating opportunities in the COVID-19 era and so had turned to the apps to “see what was out there”. So, a good time to be writing about the apps I felt. 

I had a lot of fun with that one; it definitely shed some light on people’s secret, online lives and the double-edged sword of the virtual world that we all now perpetually live in. 

But, I think I got a bit burned out from the big undertaking of the dating app post and for the next post on friendship, I didn’t talk to anyone but ended up writing more of an intimate autobiography of my high school years.

It came out on the tail end of the public uproar following the racial riots in the States. The first few months of dealing with the avalanche of information, difficult conversations and social media posts were overwhelming and it didn’t seem appropriate to be writing on my blog, so I didn’t. 

The post wasn’t meant to be my “position” on racial tensions, but just my own story on how I’ve experienced racial tension within myself, because after all, all we have is our own stories. 

That was September. Since then, I have been thinking of trying to write some great summary with some creative way of tying everything together. 

But when I was chatting with my fiancé this past week, he reminded me that although we want all our writing to be creative, there are times when our writing should just be matter of fact, telling it as it is, getting it out there. 

So, that’s it. I don’t have some grand way of ending, other than a thought that endings are good. 

I’ve never liked endings (except the day my two-week quarantine ended, that is, TODAY!!).

But I think if there’s one thing the pandemic has taught me, it’s that demarcations – ends and edges – are a good thing.

It’s a good thing to leave home and go to work, and leave work to come home.

It’s a good thing to say goodbye to friends and have graduation ceremonies.

Because when you don’t, and home flows into work into home, life can become just one big blob of grey. 

So that’s my one small thought I want to end with. Along with all the many nuggets of wisdom and insight that have come along the way while reflecting on my theology of food, beauty, work, dating, and friendship.

Writing this series has taught me that I love having deep conversations with people on why they hold to certain beliefs and how those beliefs trickle down to their everyday decisions.

It’s been a grounding thing for me in this past year of transition, change and pandemic. 

It has also made me very thankful for all the friends who have put up with my incessant questioning, intrusive surveys and too-long thought rambles (my mom tells me my posts, especially for this series, have been too long – hopefully this one is shorter for you Mom! :P)

But it is now 7:37p.m. and time to end. So that I will do.

Thanks for being with me on this journey. It’s been a good one.