We Stood Upon Stars: why you should read it

June 9, 2017 Susan Arico

There's a new book out, published last month, called We Stood Upon Stars. It's a book unlike other books-- memoir + travel guide + geography-based essays, built on soulish ponderings.

It's very much worth your time.

Author Roger Thompson is an adventurer, entrepreneur, family man, vanagon-driver, soul-wrestler. The book aims (in its own words) to help readers "embark on adventures that kindle spiritual reflection, personal growth, and deeper family connections." And it succeeds.

The Thompson VW van features prominently in the book; it's really the book mascot, if there is such a thing. We don't have a vanagon, but Roger's affinity for his mirrors my husband's passion for our 1996 Toyota Landcruiser, which he hand-spray-painted to "wilderness khaki" (a blog post for another time). It's our family's own adventure-mobile, which is what earned it a spot in the image above.

One boy's secrets to survival and living out adventure

June 3, 2017 Susan Arico

I run a little 5th grade "book club" for my son and a classmate of his (though since it's a mandatory thing for my son I'm not sure it technically qualifies as a "club." Thoughts?!) We read one book a month; he types answers to some written questions; then I meet with my son and his friend to discuss it. When I scoured the interwebs in October to create the book list, I came across a book I'd never heard of before: I Am David, by Anne Holm.

It's about an 12-year-old boy who's raised in an eastern European work camp in the years following World War II, escapes, and makes his way to northern Europe (and freedom). I read it last week, and it consumed me for two days. I could *not* put it down. Not the kind of response I anticipated when I casually picked up a formerly-unknown-to-me children's novel.

I found it exquisite.

The truth about fairies: secrets from my grandmother

May 26, 2017 Susan Arico

We lived overseas when I was a kid and came back to the States only occasionally. We'd vacation and visit with family, and the specialest part of it was the tree at my grandparents' house in Philadelphia. To the naked eye it was plain and ordinary tree, just standing there in corner of their suburban front yard. But it was a *magic* tree.

Because of the fairies.

The fairies knew when we came to stay at Nana and Grampy's house, you see, and when we visited they would hang tiny wrapped presents from the lowest boughs with pieces of thread. So while it looked like a standard tree, it wasn't at all. It was the fairy tree.

I don't remember what the small packages held, not a single item. What I remember is how diligently and reliably that tree offered us sweet gifts from the fairies, every time we visited. I remember the love I had for the tree and the delight we felt that the fairies had been readying things for our visit.

Simple encouragement for when you're not like your kid

April 26, 2017 Susan Arico

Were you an inside-the-box kid or outside-the-box one? What about your own children - which are they?

{SALLY'S EXPERIENCE.} In her extraordinarily helpful book Different: the Story of an Outside-the-Box Kid and the Mom who Loved Him, Sally Clarkson describes a bit about her childhood and upbringing. She describes her willfulness, extraordinary energy, and the tumultuous landscape of her inner life. She writes, "As I grew, I did struggle a lot with feeling like I was too much for most people and unacceptable to them. As a result, I have felt lonely and different most of my life... Often I wondered what was wrong with me... Why couldn't I just be like everyone else?" She was at times secretly despondent as a teen and often "needed to walk miles and miles to work off the adrenaline that days of disillusionment had built up in" her.

Sally has an outside-the-box personality and was different from her family. Her parents "could not fathom what was going on with" her. "'Why do you have so many questions?' they would ask in annoyance. 'Why can't you just be satisfied with life as it is?'" Sally says her parents loved her, but they didn't get her or know how to enter her world and offer real support. These childhood experiences equipped her to parent her outside-the-box son Nathan (with whom she co-wrote the book). She could draw on her own tendencies and history to learn to understand him... and to support him in ways she wished she'd been supported.

Do you remember? And "themes of our lives"

April 20, 2017 Susan Arico

It's Easter week, and here’s one thing I love about Easter: the remembering. Three days’ worth. The grief-filled events and somber scene of Good Friday, the quiet waiting of Saturday, the rejoicing and feasting of Resurrection Sunday. We piece the Biblical narrative together as we walk through Jesus' final days, as if we were with him. For many of us, it’s the longest stretch of practical engagement, of real “entering-in,” we do with the Bible all year.

And the remembering of communion winds into Easter remembering too. The body broken and the blood poured out. When we consider the words recounting Jesus’ sacrifice on our behalf, in our pews together with our fellow pilgrims, the Easter story again unfolds itself in our midst.

Remembering's good for us - not just Jesus' life, but our own life too. Good for the soul, and good for our faith as we walk it out. Not just good, actually, but essential… because without active remembering, we can’t keep growing into and toward our God. A robust faith can’t be maintained. A couple years back I wrote a piece for Christianity Today on this, Remember When. "Turns out that reminding ourselves—and helping others do the same—builds the kind of faith that pleases God."

Unexpected home birth: the gift of my brave warrior daughter

April 13, 2017 Susan Arico

9:30 pm, six years ago to the day. Lying on my bed, hollering for my husband at the top of my lungs. Totally unconcerned about my three kids (1, 3, and 5), sleeping in neighbouring bedrooms. Concerned only about the fourth kid who's suddenly - and so forcefully - trying to push her way out of my body. Thinking, "if he doesn't get here soon, I am going to have to birth this child myself. Like those strong farm women used to do, out in the rice fields..."

Exact thought. Am I going to have to do this myself? Because suddenly I knew that my baby girl was coming, and she was coming fast. And I couldn't get off the bed.

But my husband did come, bless him. He'd been out in the car, securing the new infant carseat... because he knew we were headed to the hospital that night. I was in labor after all; we knew the drill. I'd called the labor & delivery ward to tell them we'd soon be there. I'd called the babysitter and the doula. Everything was in motion. I was just waiting till things were further along before we headed into the hospital.

But our sweet baby girl jumped the gun and at least two stages of labor and suddenly was just READY.to.be.born. My husband called 911, and the woman - after taking our name and address and dispatching an ambulance was on its way - started walking him through how to deliver a baby.

When life is "one darn thing after another"

March 30, 2017 Susan Arico

V i s i t o r s !

Last week we hosted our very first batch in Crete. We loved having my parents stay with us and spending time with them. When it came to adapting to the nuances of Crete life they fared admirably - like the bins for used TP instead of flushing it; electric water heater if you want a shower that's hot (turned on well beforehand, mind you); navigating the Cretan roads, even! They rented a car and went sightseeing in Heraklion and Rethymno in the middle, and my dad displayed great driving prowess. They were pros.

There were some hiccups though too. My mom came down with a bad stomach bug less not two days after her arrival, which kept her in bed for a chunk of the visit. One daughter was laid up two days with a high fever. A dental crisis cropped up for another daughter, necessitating the immediate extraction of two molars- a real doozy of a dental procedure (and trust me, this poor girl has been through many). Days of pain and chipmunk cheeks. Unexpected challenges seemed to keep arising from every corner.

One year with hearing loss: what I've learned

March 23, 2017 Susan Arico

A little over a year ago, my left ear went rogue. It started ringing and didn't stop... and it turned out to be nerve damage. Permanent nerve damage, that created permanent hearing loss. So now I wear a hearing aid, and I will for the rest of my life.

There's an organization called The Mighty that builds community around issues of disability and disease, and last week they published my story: "What I would tell myself a year after experiencing sudden hearing loss." In the piece I lay out some basic information about the kind of hearing loss I have, sudden sensorineural hearing loss (SSHL), and provide a few practical takeaways. The biggest takeaway is that if I'd acted earlier, I might have been able to get my hearing restored.

What the article doesn't cover are the emotional/spiritual aspects of the journey, and if your viewpoint is anything like mine, those facets are sometimes the most interesting. I wrote my first post about my ear debacle, "A Definition of Suffering (and my gimp ear)," in the thick of the experience- just a few weeks after I'd started wearing my hearing aid. And "What, now THIS? Dealing with disappointment" came six months later, just after I'd discovered that a surgical attempt to correct (a different component of) my hearing loss had been unsuccessful. The soul wrestle comes out more in those.

In a new land: a cure for "what am I doing here?"

March 15, 2017 Susan Arico

Recently I came across a story of a man who lived far from his family in a neighbouring country for many years. Decades after his arrival, his siblings visited the country where he lived and chanced to find themselves interacting with him. But so long had it been since they'd seen him and so much did he appear a native - language, clothing, customs... that they didn't recognize him. And he didn't reveal himself. An interpreter was present at the meeting, translating between the man and his siblings, but the man in fact understood everything his siblings were saying. They were actually speaking in his mother tongue.

The setting is Egypt, thousands of years B.C. The man is Joseph. The siblings are his ten brothers who have come to beg grain because the famine in their homeland, Israel, is so severe that they fear death. The same ten brothers who'd thrown him into a cistern when he was a kid and then sold him into slavery to passing merchants - telling their father the lie that a wild animal had killed him.

So Joseph first arrives in the country destitute - betrayed, enslaved, alone. His initial job is as a house servant where he shows his smarts and gets promoted. Before long he's in charge of the whole household... whereupon his master's wife falls for him, tries unsuccessfully to seduce him, frames him, and gets him fired and imprisoned. (The stuff of modern day soap operas, I tell you.)

Loving the unlovely (when the unlovely is your kid)

February 17, 2017 Susan Arico

"Yes I know she's annoying you, but we're to love those who annoy. Yes - even now, when they haven't even stopped yet. We're even called to love our enemies - and sometimes our siblings do feel like our enemies."

I'm unsure, even as I speak the words, if they're registering with my child. Unsure if it even matters, because the words on this day are for me. I know it even as they slip from my mouth. Loving the unlovely: this is our purpose, what we're here for.

Fine. But what about when the unlovely are our own children? And we just - God help us - are at the end of ourselves and find we can't do it?

Finding your calling in a new season

January 26, 2017 Susan Arico

A favorite writing project last year was an interview I did with Amy Orr-Ewing - apologist, evangelist, and an old friend of mine - on the topic of calling. The piece, "How to Figure Out Your Calling," was for Christianity Today's blog on women in leadership.

Calling, also known as vocation: a sometimes tricky matter. What exactly are we talking about here? I like the definition attributed to Plato for a baseline: "Where your talents and the needs of the world cross, there lies your vocation.” Intersection of my talents with the world's needs.

My 4 worst habits in using time

January 19, 2017 Susan Arico

On Saturday I misplaced my watch. It turned out to be under a pile of papers on my desk (not unusual in the world of B- housekeeping stint), but I was without it for the day. Then a brief power outage set the oven clock awry, and afterwards it obstinately withheld setting functionality and refused to display the correct time. Thus... a day without a time-telling device.

It drove me bonkers.

I remember, years back, a friend intentionally took her watch off each Saturday to enjoy a day with no time pressures or demands.

Why being forceful is actually a good thing

January 12, 2017 Susan Arico

In Crete where I live, parking is... unique. Oh, cars are parked in (what I'd call) normal ways and spaces - in garages, paid parking lots, parallel parked along curbs. But they're also parked more creatively. On sidewalks. Double-parked with hazards on. Set haphazardly in dirt parking lots, where drivers snake in slowly so as not to hit others and walk away praying there'll still be an exit route open when they return. Kind of a free-for-all.

So it's always an adventure when you drive downtown. A friend of mine runs a ministry in town with her husband, a combination coffee shop/laundromat/clothing outlet located on a bustling corner. And let me tell you, this girl - a dynamo if you ever met one -knows how to optimise city parking. One time a fellow volunteer was circling the block in search of a spot, and my friend showed me a trick: create a space by rolling the large mobile dumpsters set along roadsides to another spot along the road. They're set between parked cars and take up half a potential parking spot; two together can take up a whole one. Yeah, you have to leave your car awkwardly idling in the road with - you guessed it - hazards on while you finagle large rolling carts full of trash around a bit, and your fellow motorists might not be thrilled. But it gets the job done.

When you're a mean mom, and it's Christmas

December 22, 2016 Susan Arico

There are two kinds of "mean" when it comes to being a mom.

There's the good kind, or at least what I'd call the good kind. I'm a "mean" mom to my kids (in their eyes, anyway!) when I don't let them play video games on weekdays. Or, say, when I make them pack healthy snacks for school all but once a week. When I make them go outside to play when they'd strongly prefer to be inside. When I discipline them for misbehaviour, even when they're convinced they don't deserve it. You know the stuff I'm talking about.

Fine. That kind of "mean mom" I'm willing to be - even the kind I feel I should be if I'm going to fulfill my end of this parenting gig with diligence.

Then there's the other kind. The kind when I'm simply, in fact, mean. Actually mean, not just theoretically. No bigger picture, no silver lining.

Why it's A-OK to have a messy house this Christmas

December 12, 2016 Susan Arico

So I have this daughter...

(Don't you love that? Couldn't a blog post go just about anywhere with an upfront disclaimer like that? Because I know you have a daughter... or a friend, dog, husband, whatever... who could be a story-starter too.)

She's a unique character, a keeps-you-on-your-toes type. Lots of ideas, strong opinions, energy. I've talked before about how she's gluten-intolerant; she's also a highly sensitive child.... Which is, by the way, a Real Thing. If you think you may have a family member who's very sensitive to stimulation, bright lights, itchy clothes, etc - I highly recommend Elaine Aron's work.

Living in Greece: stuff I've learned this fall

December 6, 2016 Susan Arico

Next week it'll be three months- τρεις μήνες! - living in Crete. Emily Freeman, author of Simply Tuesday, does a great "what we learned" linkup on her blog so I thought I'd jump in. Quarter of a year on an island in the Med... So here's some of what I've learned so far.

1. You look at people - the whole world, really - differently when you're on the other side of a language barrier.

What, now THIS? Dealing with disappointment

November 29, 2016 Susan Arico

Here's a quirky fact tidbit about me: I have a broken inner ear bone. You remember them, the "bones of hearing," from sixth grade science, right - the anvil, hammer, and stirrup? Smallest bones in the body? Well the top of my stirrup bone clean broke off, most random thing. The doctors I was seeing couldn't figure it out for the longest time... most because they'd never seen anything like it before.

In August I had ear surgery so the doctor could look at the thing close up and try to repair it. It was my first time going under. My husband was far away; he'd already been in our new homeland of Crete for nearly two months. Our decision for me to undergo surgery pushed my kids' and my departure to join him out by nearly another month. It was all a little intense.

The post-surgery report was good; the doctor thought he'd been able to fix it. He couldn't tell for sure because, like I said, I'm pretty much the only person ever to have this kind of bizarreness in my ear. And because full healing takes time, and I was trying to hop the first plane to Crete, since our kids were already missing the beginning of school. But my symptoms were vastly improved; it seemed successful. When I flew to Crete three weeks afterwards, it was a rosy scenario. "Phew," I thought. "So glad to have gotten that dealt with before delving into this new adventure on Crete."

When the unholiest things turn out to be the holiest

November 22, 2016 Susan Arico

None of us is particularly keen to do it. Not my husband, not me, none of our four kids. Dinner's done, table's wiped, the kitchen's finally clean. It's Sunday evening, the last shred of the weekend, and everyone's first choice would be a laid-back family movie. But we lean into it anyway, my husband pulling out his guitar and me rifling through song sheets, finding the children's Bible.

The service we'd attended that morning (and skipped last week altogether) was in Greek, and the kids couldn't get into the English translation piped-in via headphones. Eventually we let them go play in the tiny adjoining nursery area. No Sunday school, no Wednesday night AWANA, no Christian school teacher teaching verses or leading prayers. We six, here in our tall stone house in a Cretan foothill, comprise the body at this moment.

So we gather, all elbows and bumping, in the living room. Muttered complaints. The kids fight their rowdiness, spurred by stern words from me, as my husband tunes his guitar. A muted squabble over who's sitting in which seat persists well into the first song but we quell it by sheer perseverance; our singing volume finally drowns it out. Everyone loosens up a little, gives themselves to the reality that this is What We're Doing Now.

Do New Things! (What to do in the beginning)

November 14, 2016 Susan Arico

Today marks two months since I landed on this little island called Crete. This time last year I knew nothing about the place; it wasn't on my radar screen. Now I call it home. Strange world. Adventurous, cool, abrupt... and strange.

I'm a "where are we now?" kind of person; I have an assessment/evaluation gear that turns continually in my brain, like it or not. No surprise, then, sitting here at the two month mark, I'm looking back thinking... What have the past two months been spent on here? What's worked, in the beginning? What've we learned?

The thing about Doing New Things is that we all do them, throughout our lives, in big and small ways. We go to college or grad school. We start a job. We move. We have kids. We start another new job. And I'm not positive that the stuff I'm playing around with here applies to All The New Things, but my gut is that it does. You be the judge.

So without further ado, here are the things the first two months of the Great Crete Adventure have held for me.

How faith's like learning a language

October 25, 2016 Susan Arico

I don't know if you could say that we've carved out a "normal" for ourselves yet, six weeks into living in Crete, but things are definitely feeling a little more stable. The chore chart's back in action for the first time since June. We have our weekday activity schedule - gymnastics Tuesdays and Thursdays, tennis Wednesdays and Fridays. And we've started doing stuff recreationally on weekends - "participating" (quotes necessary) in an evening Chania 5K race with two other families; attending an American Halloween party; taking bike rides through the trails behind our house... plus in the driveway all the time. Turns out a steep, paved driveway's a total perk. I visited a Cretan ear doctor last week and really liked her - found her well-informed, knowledgable, attentive. A reassuring first step since I need to either get a tube inserted in my crazy misbehaving ear, or go to Athens to get my hearing aid adjusted (my manufacturer has no service providers on Crete), or both. I see her again this week.

Something that occupies a lot of our time now - my husband's and mine - is Greek. It's kind of addicting.