One Year Cheer

As you can see from the last post, it's been one fabulous year of marriage. Imperfect, sometimes tricky, funny, adorable, and yes, fabulous. Brian and I are so quirky in our own ways and I'm so glad to have someone as weird a me. What better way to commemorate than with a trip! 

We celebrated with a one night stay at the Pfister Hotel (fancy!) in Milwaukee. I've always wanted to stay there and it was just as interesting and old and cool as I envisioned. We took a tour of Lakefront Brewery, strolled along the river walk, got coffee, shopped, got free treats from our hotel, and decided that one day everyone should move to Milwaukee. It is Chicago's friendlier, smaller, less-traffic-riddled, more-local-feeling kid sister. I love it. We ate at La Merenda and could not believe our taste buds with plates full of goat cheese, Spanish potatoes, pork empanadas, chorizo, spinach, risotto, and veal. It was so stinking delicious that my mouth is watering more with every word typed.  We have my brother Alex to thank for the restaurant recommendation. The next day we strolled around the marketplace in the Third Ward neighborhood and ate lunch at Benelux (reallll good as well). It was the perfect way to celebrate one year of marriage together. 

Sorry to our checking account, Brian, but I liked it so much that we need to celebrate every year with a little trip somewhere, right? Or at least will you guys all move to Milwaukee with us? I'd like to take over a small city with everyone I know and make it mine. Okay cool. Sounds great. 

Beer and Hymns? Please and Thanks.

I just have to tell you guys about this amazing experience I had on Friday night. I wasn't feeling too hot after a long week and this was just the thing I needed. Our friends Danny and Reese included us in their work friends' plans at a great spot in Glen Ellyn called Blackberry Market. Go visit, Chicagoans. I've moved its name to the top of my Saturday-afternoon-coffee-date list. 

Beyond the beautiful setting was this amazing idea that someone had to reclaim that old tradition of living out faith in the pubs (holla C.S. Lewis!!), and decided to have a Beer and Hymn night. It was wonderful. The place was packed, the beer was cold, and I just couldn't stop smiling. I think I said "I LOVE THIS" to Brian 47 times throughout the night like the nerd I am. There were a few times where I just stood in awe and had to catch the magic on film. Watch the clips below to get a feel for the atmosphere.  

You guys, I felt like I was in a holy place during these songs. I'm not the best at feeling the tangible presence of God. I like writing about Him, reading about Him, or thinking and discussing Him, but I'm not well practiced in always feeling His presence. In moments like these, it was undeniable: God showed up. And you could feel it.  

On Being Done With Having a Hard Time

Today. Hmmm. Well, I'll just say that it involved a flat tire, a dead cell phone, and being locked out of my apartment. All of this is small potatoes in the realm of real problems. I'm privileged to have a car with the flat tire on it, enough money to buy groceries, and an apartment from which I can be locked out. This "bad" day made me think of some other truly bad days I've had in my life...but more on that soon. 

This past Friday night, I got to eat dinner with two of my favorites, Sam and Julia. You've met them before, but in review, they are my friends through Teach for America. They were there with me from day one of our training at the crazy summer of Institute, teaching middle school even though we would all spend our first year in lower elementary. We all were at three different schools with different challenges, but our experience was the same: it was a Hard Time. I will be real with you and tell you that my first two years of my adult career life involved lots and lots and lots of bad days. Not just "bad" days either, but the real kind. 

Julia phrased it this way: "It's so great being done having a hard time." All three of us completed two years of teaching at our placement schools, and all three of us chose to stay in this teaching profession after our commitment to Teach for America was done. We all found new jobs for our third year of teaching (a healthy decision for all of our lives) and came together to share about the new things going on. Boyfriends, husbands, apartments, coworkers, classrooms, students, principals, and travels were all on our minds and in our conversation. All those things, of course, in between our rants and raves about the fantastic food we ate at Big Jones, the place where we met. Can you say fancy fried chicken?! (Seriously, go visit.)

At the end of our night, Julia made that comment. About how wonderful it is to be past a really hard time in our lives. And how it is so special to now have that awareness of how hard it truly was, on the other side, alive and okay and still somewhat emotionally intact. I'm realizing, upon looking back, that I had no idea how lonely, depressed, frustrated, and difficult those two years were for me while I was living them. I was so obsessed with making it through the day, finishing my action items from four different managers and bosses, following my to-do lists, keeping up with grad school homework, and surviving each milestone (....Friday......Christmas...summer??...) that I had never paused to take stock and feel, truly feel, the weight of what was going on around me. I felt like a failure, but I hardly had any time to process that. Failure or not, the next day was coming and the next week had to be planned. I just kept going. My full schedule kind of saved me from feeling anything too deeply. 

Does God do that on purpose - overload your life in the hardest of times - to protect you from the hard stuff? Does he add weights to your feet so that you never look up toward the surface to realize that you're drowning? I truly think that's how we all made it: too busy running around to know that we were run down. It was chaos for sure, and these are two of the only people I have in my life who know exactly what that felt like. And yet, in those hard times, we became something. 

We became grownups, advocates (for ourselves and others), and teammates. We became teachers. We became graduates of schools and of an organization with a mission dear to all of our hearts. We became better people, capable of intelligent conversations based in experience, and more fully able to show compassion to others in a struggle because we lived one ourselves. We became more aware of our world and how we can best take our places as agents of change and redemption within it. 

So sure, we all will have "bad" days here and there. We still have hard times...sometimes...and in different ways. But it is so sweet to know, that in the ebbs and flows of life, that you have made it past a difficult season. You've come through a Hard Time and are done with it. Maybe a future season will hold something even more difficult; surely dark days are on the path of everyone's journey, right? But for now, for one Friday night, it was sweet to celebrate the light. 

The best part about being done with having a hard time?

Sharing it with friends who made it through with you. 

R.I.P B.W.W

Mark this day. 

Tonight, Brian and I swore we would never again eat at a Buffalo Wild Wings together.

I agreed; it was time. 

This, coming from a girl who would happily join in the group of her friends on Thursday nights in college for cheap wings and friendship. It was a land flowing with ranch and Honey BBQ. Good times were had by all. Jokes were cracked. Memories were made. Passive voice was used by some. 

I'm not exactly sure what happened to the place between college and adulthood, but we stopped there for dinner tonight and let me say: it was bleak.

It all started when I got home from work. I was all set to begin dinner, but Brian (I love this guy) could detect that I was exhausted. Not really up for doing anything much after school tonight. He suggested I refrain from cooking and said we should go somewhere quick for dinner tonight, so I could take the night off from making us food. (Have I mentioned how much I love him?) 

So we're driving along, and there it is. B Dubs in all of its glory. There's a playoff baseball game tonight that Brian wanted to catch. So we kind of shrug at one another and say, "Let's give it a shot." 

First of all, is it just me, or does everyone look completely depressed in there?! We almost laugh out loud as we scan the room and see a dimly lit collection of people questioning their very purpose in this world. B Dubs was putting people through this kind of existential crisis: "Who am I?" "Why am I here?" "What meaning is there in this life if the highlight of my day is spent at this stale restaurant?" There are bored couples, blank-stare groups of buddies with mouths agape at television screens, and, the most heart-wrenching: the overwhelmed parents. There are kids everywhere screaming and crying with parents who look like all they need was a hug (and perhaps, more importantly, a cocktail). It's like one of those biblical "weeping and gnashing of teeth" scenarios everywhere you look. People with kids: I don't know how you do it. 

So we sit down. We are surrounded by SIXTEEN TELEVISIONS. On those televisions are preseason hockey, college women's volleyball, sports talk shows (with no audio, mind you), and soccer. Not one TV has the playoff baseball game. To make matters worse for Brian, the largest screen of them all, in the middle of the main dining room, is replaying Sunday's footage of the Philadelphia Eagle's loss. Guess what music is playing in the background. Creed. I'm not even joking you guys. This is rough. 

Then our food comes out, mainly microwaved and plastered to small little paper trays. Even our appetizer is prepared in this manner. Brian hypothesizes that there are no chefs at Buffalo Wild Wings, only Microwave Technicians. Perhaps this is cause for some investigatory journalism.

We finally get our food, eat, chat, watch a little baseball, and get out pretty quickly. Already on the ride home we feel all fuzzy in our brains and kind of sick to our stomachs. It was at this point when we make the vow: never again will this Whartnaby clan dine at B Dubs. 

B.W.W.  may you R.I.P. 

Catch Up

I've been looking back at the last few weeks of May and realized that I haven't done too much reflecting, and therefore not all that much blogging. A LOT has happened and many little things have popped up, both really good and sometimes not so good, but I've been hurtling in fast-forward-mode for the past month or so. I have a lot to catch up on. I would say that it would be a lot to catch YOU up on, as a reader of my blog, but that's not quite how I work when it comes to writing. I'm not so concerned with how the audience thinks about my life. Perhaps that sounds a bit selfish, but I process things through writing about them, and so it's good for me to sit down, think something through, and catch myself up on it just by writing about it. It's like I don't know how I really feel about something until I write about it. Then I read what I just put on the paper and that's how I know my opinions, feelings, fears, and desires. Odd, I know, but it's a lot cheaper than a therapist. For now, I'll catch up on that very thing: catching up.

Fancy grilled cheese. The kind that sticks to your ribs. In the best way. 

Last week I had the wonderful opportunity to catch up with two dear friends of mine here in Chicago: Sam and Julia. They represent my struggle and my sanity here in these two years through TFA. We three started in the very, very, very first day of training together and taught summer school at the same school that first summer. While we all work at different schools, I cherish the chances I get to catch up with them because they've been there from the start. They get it. They always will get it. And they will get it in a way that many other people just can't, simply because many other people just weren't there since the very, very, very first day. I also cherish the fact that they have fabulous taste in restaurants and want to meet me at fabulous locales.

Brian always thinks I say "sammich" because I don't annunciate the D in
"sandwich." I like to argue this point. 

This time was no different, as we met for dinner at the Little Goat Diner, the cafe-style restaurant in the West Loop associated with the blockbuster Girl and the Goat restaurant for which it might take 6 months to get a reservation. Thankfully, this spot had a slightly more affordable venue and a considerably shorter wait. I highly recommend it. We got a spot at a communal table (one of the quirks I love about the place) and gawked at the interesting offerings. Sam and I both opted for the fancy grilled cheese, and we three split some unbelievably good pies for dessert: a PB and J pie, as well as a passionfruit-oreo concoction.

PB & J pie. And passionfruit oreo. 

Sitting there, stuffed to the brim, sipping the last remains of my Spanish Cava that left bubbles in my nose as I listened to updates, rants, and funny stories, I was pleasantly pleasant. Two friends that are unbelievably smart, kind, thoughtful, and with great taste. Something about making it through Teach For America together will keep them forever in my heart. And my stomach. Because trying a great restaurant is a fabulous excuse to catch up, at least in my book.

Eating Out

Spring and Summer in Chicago has seen a big change in my budget. The amount alloted for food has been severely increased. And we're not talking groceries. The weather is nice and I am just throwing money out the window on restaurants. In some ways I feel guilty, but in other ways I just am embracing the goodness of getting dinner with friends.

What is it about eating together that makes us so happy? (Or, rather, makes ME so happy?) Going out to eat is quickly becoming my favorite way to spend my money. Almost over going out, concerts, or traveling (although I love all those three things of course). Without much of a summer (I go back to school in less than 2 weeks...) this has been one little way I've been making my summer feel more like a vacation.

Jen (the roommate) at Ba Ba Reeba

out at Native Foods (a vegan place...I'm branching out people) 

Heidi came to visit!

Sniped.  

 

Sam I am.

Last weekend I had the privilege to meet up with a dear friend. Sam has been around forever. Not really, he's only 24, but for forever to me. He went to school with me at Oostburg Christian grade school, Sheboygan County Christian High, and Trinity Christian College. So yes, we're definitely Christian school kids...but I would contest some of the cool ones. Ha.

He's seen me through the awkward years and still chooses to hang out with me, which, my friends, is the mark of a true friend. He's living in Milwaukee (which I love more and more each time I visit) and doing a cool job at an urban ecology center. Yeah, one of those smart science people. We got together for breakfast at a really cool place called Comet Cafe. I felt super hip and ate some delicious eggs. I've found that good food and good company is a combination you just can't beat.