embracing humility

Recently we took a weekend trip up to Paris to visit some friends before they return home to the states, having finished their stint year with Agape...I have learned it is normal (and often necessary and/or therapeutic) to compare notes with other folks who have picked up and moved to a different country for whatever the reason, so one of our friends asked us what has been the biggest or most unexpected culture shock for us.

My answer was the language barrier. And you may chuckle at me to hear that because it's like "um, Kel, you were moving to FRANCE where they speak FRENCH and you've never learned french in your life...did you not see that one coming??"

And you would be right to laugh at me because I laugh at me! And if you were a part of any of my verbal-processing-outpourings in the days and weeks before we moved, you know that I was indeed aware of the language change and that I was preparing to approach it as my job to learn the new language. So how could the language barrier still be my biggest and most unexpected culture shock?

I knew the language wouldn't be the same. But I was completely and totally not seeing the big picture. That language is not just this one piece of life that everything else can keep cruising without. Language is one of the keys to everything.

Language is not just words - it is communication.

And communication...well, to an extroverted, people-loving, people-needing, external-processing TALKER like myself, communication is the foundation of everything.

And it is so very very humbling to be without it.


You know me, I am all about the emotions and I feel lots of them and I feel them often :) All of the following emotions have been felt in the past 4 months: joy, fear, relief, physical exhaustion, gratitude, mental fatigue, hope, depression, contentment, nervousness, grief, love, adventureness (?), defeat, victory, welcome, homesickness, worry, worship, selfishness, grace, discouragement, encouragement, guilt, sadness, confidence, conviction, determination...but the best word to sum up everything I've experienced and learned so far is humility.


- It is humbling to slow down the checkout line because you don't understand the process and what is being said to you about what you need to do

- It is humbling to cry in front of strangers because you are overwhelmed (even for me!)

- It is humbling to to be singled out as the one who can't understand and to require special assistance

- It is humbling for grocery trips to take over an hour and require lapping the store 3 times, google translate, and finally texting a friend for help trying to find an item, because you are too nervous to try to ask an employee because what if you can't say it right to ask

- It is humbling to be reminded that life goes on without you at the places that you used to be a part of, that you used to be a functioning cog of the process

- It is humbling to try to figure out if you can offer anything as a cog in a new process

- It is humbling to lose pieces of identity or personality - humbling to realize what idols things had become in your life or what stock you put in being "the leader" or "the teacher" or "the center of attention" or "the funny one" or "the head of the mofia phone tree who always got everyone rallied to do fun things" - humbling to realize that it's a challenge to do those things without being able to speak

- It is humbling to feel forgotten

- It is humbling to confidently speak to a server and have them stare back in utter lack of comprehension

- It is humbling to be unwilling to knock on the neighbors' doors because you just don't feel up to trying to have a conversation in french about mice, and humbling to feel proud about successfully writing notes in french to those neighbors --(even typing that is humbling -- Why did I feel proud of writing notes?? Come on, Kelly, be brave and not so scared of having to talk, for goodness sake! What's the worst that can happen by knocking on the neighbor's door?)

- It is humbling to try to talk to the young daughters of your minister and to be so sweetly comforted by the elder's "c'est pas grave" ("that's okay, it's not a big deal") when the little one speaks french you can't understand so you have to tell them "je suis desole je ne parle pas beaucoup francais" ("i'm sorry I don't speak a lot of french")

And so many other examples!


But y'all, living a life that humbles you is also really beautiful. Because what I have learned is that the humility I have been forced into has been sweeping out a lot of junk that I didn't want in me anyway - pride, self-righteousness, arrogance, self-centeredness...

The humility has been sweeping out junk and making room for a spirit of gratitude and grace.

A spirit that is learning a little more every day what it actually means to believe God when he says that his grace is sufficient for us.

A spirit that is learning a little more every day to not take things so much for granted.

To be grateful for the text or email that means I'm thought of,
To be grateful when I order food successfully at a boulangerie without getting the server out of their rhythm by not understanding me,
To be grateful for the people who go out of their way to offer help or translation or explanation,
To be grateful for the strengthened marriage foundation we've laid by doing something really hard in our first year,
To be grateful for the technology that makes real-time, real-relationship-building communication possible with my littles,
To be grateful for the sanctifying that will make me a more welcoming person to people who are far from the life they know,
To be grateful for the global and local Body of Christ,
To be grateful for the challenge of being pushed to figure out new ways I can serve,

To be grateful for this day. And to embrace the humility.


Y'all, it's such a rollercoaster ride. But God is so faithful! And each day is so worth it.

Breakthrough

Moving to a country where you don't know the language, far from friends and family, which meant leaving the job and students that you love, with your husband who you're still learning how to be married to...is a big giant adventure.

And it is also really very hard.

I don't feel a need to write out all the details of the last couple weeks of February - partly because I don't want to revisit them, partly because I don't think you want to read them, and partly because I am really not proud of the level of selfishness that was the root of a lot of it. (But you know that this external processor without much filter is generally an open book, so if you do want to know about them you can ask)

Suffice it to say that it was a very doldrums-y time in my heart and mind.

BUT Jesus is faithful to work. Even when I'm just floundering in my seemingly inescapable blah-ness.

So, this is a list of things that have been life-giving and light-shining-into-the-darkness, and have helped/caused me to get off my batookus and fight the doldrums out of life here. Some of it is scripture, some of it is moments in time, some of it is people, some of it is music. All of it is the Lord's faithfulness.

*Dave is a kind husband and we both want a healthy and joyful marriage (poor guy wasn't getting much joy out of his wife lately). Enter: intentionally improved communication, weekly working dates (thanks, IntimateMarriage conference, that we went to in Memphis several months ago!), significantly reduced technology in the bedroom (get out of here, facebook!!), reading and discussing brief blurbs before sleep (thanks for the book, Casey-Mama!), and just a lot more intentional JOY in lots of little, daily, easy-to-overlook-but-SO-important ways -- spoiler alert: a lot of life (and marriage) is choosing joy, choosing grace, choosing mercy.

*The pastor from Hillsong Paris, Brandon White, came down on Feb 28 and preached at Hillsong Lyon. And it was spot on what was needed. He preached about how God is a god of breakthroughs - He is not stopped or bound by the things that feel like obstacles or bindings to us. I can do some things in my own strength but the best thing I can do is to lean in to the God who brings change; to choose (back to that verb again!), to choose with my measure of faith to trust Him. I have the Word, I know His promises, I have witnessed Him in the world and in my life - so Lord, open my eyes to see what you see; open my mouth with your words; and help me to act on your truth that I believe and know to be true. And shared time of prayer as a body of believers - so time for Dave and me to be together praying (him speaking, me weeping) for our marriage, for our life here, for now, and for the future.

* https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LtDXHgTi-5s Went back to some music I haven't listened to in years. This is one of my favorite Jon Foreman songs - just peaceful, beautiful, TRUE words straight from scripture. If the link doesn't work, please go listen to it on youtube. Just put in Jon Foreman - "The House of God Forever"

*Hillsong Lyon, in general, has been such a rich place to have plugged in right away. There is no replacement for community with other believers.

*Related to the above, we attend an English-speaking Connect group through Hillsong (we're hoping to go to a neighborhood one as well once we have more French) - and those people are beautiful souls. Being embraced without hesitation and welcomed in allows such peace in my spirit - the coziness of the beginnings of family.

* https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Sv_876eqxg Tristan (from connect group) lent us a couple Hillsong cds. I've listened to one of them a lot while organizing the apartment. This song usually gets listened to several times in a row and/or is the one played first and last. If the link doesn't work, put in Hillsong "Even When it Hurts"

*I was invited to a monthly sisterhood Bible study by my friend Elin (can we just talk about how much gratitude I feel that I even have people already who are in my heart as real and dear friends?) - it was 10 of us with no totally common language (a few of us are very beginners in French and one who has very little English), but that didn't stop us from having good study of Sarai/Sarah and real sharing of God's work and promises in our lives. When sharing about how important the promise of God's presence had been for me in the preparation to move, I broke down because I realized that I was sitting in the midst of that promise. All fall and winter as the Lord protected me from fear about the move it was through the promise that He is here, in France, too, and that as we prepared from our end He was preparing too - going ahead of us to prepare the people and places to receive us. And there I was looking at one example of the reality of that promise - this community of women who had a place for me amongst them.

*I have always been able to rely on the church, community, friends, leaders around me to push me to grow in my faith or make it easy to do so. Well, the past week I have stepped up to be the real owner of my faith myself! (I've done so in the past at other times, but not recently). So my I-have-spent-time-with-God-because-I-read-the-She-Reads-Truth-for-today quiet times have morphed into reading with pen and journal in hand for thoughts and prayers, digging into my study bible notes on the passages (I get nerdily into these sometimes), and then reading out loud to myself the same passage from the French part of my bilingual Bible. It is confusing and hard sometimes but there is a comfort in struggling through words that I already have the understanding of, and being excited to learn the new words for the same Truth so that I can speak with people here.

*It's been raining a lot here. Sorry to everyone who hates it. But my heart is content with the drops on the skylight and the life-giving, soul-encouraging water.

*Dave's coworkers are so kind. We had a very fun bowling outing with a lot of them last night (company organized fun night!) and, again, being welcomed with smiles and encouragement (for learning the language) for being here is heart-warming.

*Our bed (and not having Ellie in it) has gotten way more comfortable since when we slept on it in Memphis. I'm sure it's not just the comparison after six weeks of air mattress ;) But my goodness, a good night's sleep makes a BIG difference about one's readiness for a new day!

* http://www.boundless.org/relationships/2011/handling-homesickness Liz sent me this link when I told her how I was struggling at one point. It is helpful to just know that you're not alone. And much wisdom here.

*Friends and family at home are still connected - cards, skype, whatsapp, facetime, imessage, facebook. It all brings people closer in a way that is irreplaceable.

*James (approaching 3 year old nephew, for those who don't know) prays for us (Uncle Dave, Aunt Kelly, and Ellie :) ) before naps and bedtimes sometimes, and hearing that from his own mouth is just joy-giving.

*In the midst of my doldrums I was reminded of my core of selfishness (thank you, Jesus, for redemption and sanctification!!) because my response to feeling so alone and adrift was to turn inward and self-focused. I was very ungracious in some of my thoughts towards others during that time. So on my first day of I-really-mean-it-and-will-invest quiet time, these words from the ESV study Bible about Matthew 18:35 (the end of the parable of the unforgiving servant) were just the wake-up call I needed:

A transformed heart must result in a changed life that offers the same mercy and forgiveness as has been received from God. Someone who does not grant forgiveness to others shows that his own heart has not experienced God's forgiveness. Throughout Scripture, the heart refers to the center of one's being, including one's reason, emotions, and will.

(emphasis mine)

That has really been the moral of this month of down and up for me - dwell in and be grateful for the presence of the Lord, and allow my transformed heart leaning into and learning more of his Truth to be the driving force of my life, not fear or loneliness. It is not a fight that's totally over - the doldrums still try to creep in and steal joy or peace from moments when I let my guard down...but I'm getting better at recognizing and thwarting attempts (with the help of both my swell husband and my amazing Lord).

I hope that if anyone is feeling similarly that there are nuggets in this that the Spirit will lodge in your heart as an encouragement from the Lord.

Love to all!

A quick word on dog poo in France...

Dog poo.

Or "caca de chien" if you want to get french with it.

The stereotype is that it is all over France because people take their dogs everywhere with them (for walks, to dinner, to the post office, while shopping, etc...) and feel no compulsion to pick up after their pooch relieves themself all over the sidewalk.

As is the case with french people nomming on their baguettes while walking around town, this stereotype, alas, is also full of truth.

The GOOD news is that the streets are cleaned a bunch. And most of the poo that I see is off to the side such that the pooch at least had the decency to not create an obstacle course down the direct middle of the sidewalk or street. Usually, that is.

What has blown my mind is that the people who don't seem to own the animals with a sense of "let me do my business over here, slightly out of the way" also seem to be the people who don't own regular dogs. Based on the size of their evidence, there must be people in Lyon who own horses or small elephants....and I just haven't been out at the right time to catch a glimpse.

Because HOLY GUACOMOLE the size of some of these shoe-ruiners!! Have never seen the likes of them in the US. (prob because I haven't lived anywhere where it is conducive to owning a small elephant)

*Side note: I did learn the other day that the legality surrounding this subject seems to vary from city to city - in Lyon, I learned, you could be fined if you are walking your dog and do not have a means by which you could remove your dog's caca if they choose to display it on the sidewalk (a bag, some paper, a handful of leaves, etc). Don't know how often that is enforced, but it's nice to know the fine exists!

**Additional side note: I'm grateful that my frequency of having to pick up Ellie's business has actually decreased here, not because I've become a french person who doesn't care, but because we have a pet friendly stretch of strategic bushes along the Saône, so as long as she hops up under them to handle things I am good to go. (Good job being a little pup who likes fertilizing the bushes, Eleanor Rigby!)

***Another side note: If my dog is a telling sample size, not all of this problem might be the fault of the french poochies and their owners...I think that dogs might just produce more poo here! I don't know if it's the water...or the new food...or so many places that have been marked by other dogs that the body just starts to work in over time in order to produce more to also mark those places...but there's been an increase in poo production from SBERTDOAS on our walks. So maybe french people really do believe in picking up after their animals it's just that they are constantly one bag short for all the poo produced on their walks. I'm sure that's it. ;)

One month on this new roller coaster ride...

One month ago today, Dave and I got on a plane and headed off for our new life in Lyon.

One month ago...
31 days ago...
(I was going to dramatically go into the hours and minutes and seconds, but then I have to somehow figure out time difference stuff, and when we got on the plane, and when we got off the plane, and all the things....so you are saved from some of my drama. Say thank you to the complicatedness of time :) )

I keep expecting to feel what I normally feel about the passage of time - that it is going super fast and super slowly simultaneously.

But as I was pondering this while walking Sweet Baby Eleanor Rigby the Destroyer of all Sadness* this morning, I realized that I'm not feeling that expected dichotomy. Currently I'm feeling that there's no way it has only been a month, that I must have left Cornerstone and we must have left our friends and Memphis and everything we formerly knew (ya see how I throw in the drama?), that that big momentous departure had to have been ages ago. That we've been suspended in this new place - hanging in the "transition phase" of language barriers, of "camping" in our apartment with just our air mattress for furniture, of no set friend group, of no set routines, of figuring out how bills work, of wondering where to buy things we need because Kroger and Target don't exist... - we've been suspended in this new place forever.

I don't know why I feel that way, but it's the truth of how I feel currently.

I'm wondering/hoping/anticipating that the arrival of the shipping container with the rest of our belongings (hopefully this coming Monday or Wednesday!) will help bring some "this is not just an odd transitional floaty stage y'all are in, you really did move here and this is now your life" realness to my mind.

In case you're wondering how I celebrated this one month lunaversary** - I first had a horribly ridiculous meltdown within 15 minutes of being awake; followed by about an hour of watching clips and reading articles about the Duke vs Carolina game that I slept through because it was at 3am and I forgot that we finally have wifi in our home and I may have been able to watch it if I'd set my alarm and found it somewhere online; followed by a very stressful but successful phone call to make a doctor's appointment (more on that in a minute); followed by some MUCH needed time with Jesus. On the lineup for the rest of the day - my three hour French class and a dinner at a pub with some of Dave's coworkers.

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A quick asterisks explanation because I feel their unexplainedness hanging over my head:
* I married Dave and he helped me realize that I had not been calling Ellie by her full name (how horrible of me) and that her full name is actually Sweet Baby Eleanor Rigby the Destroyer of all Sadness. As "SBERTDOAS" is a weird nickname, I've continued to call her Ellie which my husband graciously allows. Her french id tag (which I ordered yesterday - hooray!) will say Eleanor.
** My mom coined the phrase lunaversary when I was in high school because in fact it is not calendarally or astrologically accurate to call a celebration of one month of anything an anniversary. So shout to Robin Prak for that one.
_______

Several people have told me I should start a blog about our #frenchfords adventures. Their requests reminded me that I did in fact already have a blog and that it was in fact already about experiencing the world....so here I am, typing away :) I cannot promise that this blog will always be very interesting, or very adventurous...since it's mine I will claim the right to be boring and self-reflective and dramatic if I feel the need. Just a disclaimer!

The two things I'll finish with today are the story of my aforementioned phone call to the doctor's office (because I am just proud, not because it's particularly interesting) and a list of things about life here.

The Story.
From the other american couple that moved here at the beginning of January for Dave's company (shout out to Tim and Paula!), we'd received a list of various types of health professionals in the Lyon area who speak English. I needed to make an appointment in order to have a prescription renewed (because who knows how to do that here? not me!), so I google mapped where the few options were and chose the one within a 30 minute walk. I called yesterday and got a message that was in rapid french and all I could figure out was that it contained two alternate phone numbers, but they were spoken so quickly that even with my new knowledge of french numbers (WHICH ARE HARD, BTW), I didn't think I'd be able to get them copied down with repetitive listenings to the message, and even if I did - who knows what the numbers would actually connect me to?? Ah, the adventures of living in a language you don't understand. So I messaged a kind french woman I know to see if she wouldn't mind calling the number at some point to copy down the numbers for me. (Felt SO silly making that request and I told her so - you'll never survive a move like this if you're unwilling to be humble and helpless!) She wasn't available and Paula helped me realize that I'd probably called during lunch hour, so this morning I was ready to try again. The line rang (which in France is actually just slow beeping) and a real live person answered. And our conversation began like this:

Receptionist: Bonjour,
Me: Bonjour, je suis désolé je ne parle pas beaucoup français. Parlez-vous anglais? [Hello, I'm sorry I do not speak good french. Do you speak english?]
Receptionist: Non
Me: J'ai besoin un rendez-vous s'il vous plaît...Je suis américaine mais j'habite à Lyon maintenant [I need to make an appointment please. I am an american but I live in Lyon now]

I won't write out the entire conversation, but the gist of it is that I managed to tell her why I needed the appointment, give her my basic information, confirm that the doctor she told me I'd see can speak english, and confirm that I was understanding the right appointment date. I then immediately texted Dave to tell him what happened and that I felt like vomiting from stress, but that I'd DONE it. (And my supportive husband echoed my pride with his own :) ).

This may not seem like a big deal to you. But I have learned that phone conversations are absolutely the hardest, so I am ridiculously excited about this successful interaction!! And honestly still get a little nervous stomachache while thinking about it because, good night irene, it's stressful.

And I'm such a teacher's pet that part of me wants to run to school and tell my teachers how I did! (but I should probably finish this blog post and do my homework first....)


The List.
this is a list of randomly ordered observations that I've made while living here, of differences - no judgment passed on good or bad (usually)...or of just random things I want to share

- dog poo is everywhere
- the drier has a thing that I pull out after every load and dump the water that it's just sucked out of the clothing down the sink
- related to the above, the washer has some kind of hose that I couldn't understand anything the installation man told me about it so I haven't messed with it. hopefully that continues to go okay
- I get text messages from the phone company about random sales that other stores are having
- the sterotypical image of french people walking around eating baguettes is real life
- the bread here is FLIPPING AMAZING. seriously. the idea of not living near this bread again makes part of me want to fall in love with France and never leave.
- the kiwis we got from the street market two weeks ago are the greatest kiwis I've ever tasted in my life (Dave also felt this way about one of the oranges he had, from the same vendor -- maybe she uses magic to grow her produce)
- I don't know where to buy stuff
- sales don't happen all the time here - there are two sale seasons (one after Christmas and one in the summer) so everybody gotta get everything bought up then
- there are two trees in our apartment left her by the previous tenant that weren't watered for about 5 months. I'm trying to save them. If you have a green thumb, send me your green energy
- the river is still getting higher - I'm interested to witness it's habits here, having lived near the Mississippi for so long
- lots of streets are one way so you only have to look one way before crossing the street
- hot chocolate is made by steaming hot milk and then putting a blob of solid chocolate in it on the end of a popsicle stick. not as sweet, but quite delicious
- I haven't seen milk sold in anything bigger than a liter yet
- lots of things are smaller here: dishwashers, ovens, trash cans, fridges, serving sizes, drink cans, candy servings
- our toilet is in a room all by itself with just a little sink
- most places have "seche serviettes" in the shower room - towel warmers!
- I get a text message from the water company that I'm responsible for checking the water meter and reporting the number to them next week
- sometimes peeing by people happens in public. I've seen multiple parents with young children take them over to bushes, pull their pants down and hold them up so they can pee. I don't know if adults do this too...stay tuned
- numbers from 70-99 are really hard. 70 is soixante-dix which literally means "60-10", and then once you get to 80 it is quatre-vingt which is literally "4-20"...so 99 is quatre-vingt-dix-neuf which is "4-20-19"
- phones don't ring, they beep
- some places charge for plastic bags - I think this is a great idea to encourage people to use reusable bags

....I have many more but I really do need to do my homework (I was distracted by my meltdown this morning, don't worry - normally I don't leave it until this late!) and then grab a bite of lunch from the neighborhood boulangerie (bakery) on my way to class.

We are grateful for technology every day so don't hesitate to message, post, whatsapp, email, skype, snail mail at us! We love you all!

Special hugs from me to anyone who actually made it to the end of this rambling, no order, non important information post - I don't promise that next time will be better. #reallife ;)

Kelly out. Mwah!