Ende[e]ring

I've told the story before of how Naomi Deering came into my life, but I find that I have neglected to mention the ways in which the Deering family has filled up my life.

It was the original kindness of Mr. and Mrs. Deering that led myself and Kyle Schmidt to their home in Carrickfergus for an afternoon of tea, dogtime, a hike by the lighthouse, and my first experience with poor bear (honeycomb) ice cream from Maud's.

It was then and there that I met Naomi and she herself who reconnected with me last summer.

From there, it was Naomi who consistently instigated conversation with me all through the summer and following semester, taking me away from home and into hers for tea and New Girl. I gave her little to work with, but she kept pursuing me. I really needed that. Knowing she would be here gave me that extra boost of courage I needed to come back here at the end of January.

In that time period, I again received hospitality from her aunt, uncle, and cousins who let me into their home for tea (of course) on one of my first outings (innings) with Naomi.

Before October was even over, she had asked and had received permission to invite me for Christmas with her family in Spain, then Belfast when they decided to come over instead.

If I hadn't come home so early, I would have been removed to their home for a couple weeks.

This semester, I again had Naomi (on a much more equal and balanced level of friendship, thank goodness) and, in April, had the great pleasure of being driven out to the countryside to the family farm where I was taken care of by her delightful grandparents (and met a whole slew of family members).

Finally, I spent this past weekend in the highlands of Scotland with Naomi's brother and driven home from our final ferry by her cousin.

Ten months.

Ten months and more than ten family members.

The Deering family has demonstrated to me what hospitality and love looks like lived out in the day-to-day. I will forever be thankful to them.

A Little Craic Never Hurt Nobody

Try saying that in an American airport...

Also, if you haven't caught the fact that nearly every single one of my titles is the name or line of a song. As a general suggestion, you should google them, except insert "party" for "craic" here. :)

Saturday was a right ole 4* day. If it were 5*, it just wouldn't be Irish.

The day started with Naomi and Craig. We were meant to go climb Slemish Mountain, but it was, as Naomi says, "pishin' out the skies" with rain, so we kept it close instead.

After we'd grabbed Craig, we drove to Brown's Bay, which is north of Carrickfergus on the coast.

They said when it's super sunny, the place is packed, but for us it was quiet and just downright gorgeous.

It's this lovely little sand beach with a hill overlooking it stuffed full of these yellow flowers. Extending out past the high grass hill and into the water are these large boulders you can climb all over.

We climbed, we saw cool birds and swimming seals, we breathed in salty fresh air, and we listened to the curls of the waves as they twisted round the rocks.

Post dander, involving Naomi and I sinking into bog up to our calves, we drove down to Port Muck (yuck!) for a wee BBQ.

Muck Island, where Port Muck is located, is actually a bird sanctuary, fun fact.

It was crazy windy, so Craig's first attempts at lighting the instagrill were kind of a fail. So, we hid behind a wall (which seemed to be there without purpose in the middle of a field) and tried again.

 Did I mention that we also forgot a knife? Yeah. So, Craig brandished a stick to flip the sausages and tear them apart. he may or may not have burnt his fingers, but those sausages were finger-licking good and put in between two slices of white bread.

After sausages, we (and by we I mean Craig) decided it was a good idea to put my lemon glazed cookies and the Chips Ahoy (or, at least, the British equivalent) on grill.

Oh, the caramelized sugar. :)

A little wet-butted for wear and smelling like smoke, we peaced out and I headed off to my next suaree.

Part B of the evening was a birthday party for my MA friend Emma.

The whole class (yes, all 4 of us) were there! Wait! Not true. Jo didn't come. But 4 out of 5 is still pretty good odds.

We started out at Made in Belfast for dinner. Since I had had lunch not an hour previous, I got soup. Unsurprisingly potato. Surprisingly delicious. Possibly the best potato soup I've ever tried.

Chocolate torte with salted caramel ice cream for dessert.

Later, we landed at Lavery's Pub to get our dance on.

Dance we did, the whole night long, attracting fun strangers to join us as we went on.
What can I say? Wherever we go, that's where the party's at. 

Are You There, God? It's Me, Margaret.

That clip is from my one of my all-time favorite movies. More than anything I could write, it sums up my semester here. Less bitter and defiant on my part, though. Probably. God may disagree if you asked him.

Happy Friday the 13th, y'all.

Highlights from today?

ha. I don't even...where to start?

It ended?

That's not fair. I went and saw a movie tonight with Naomi and her boyfriend/not boyfriend/on and off boyfriend Craig. Frozen. It was just good, clean, sharp wit. Hilarious. Loved it. Then back to hers for gingerbread cookies and, of course, tea.

Got Indian food with Elaine this afternoon and brainstormed a wider band for one of my paper topics. I simply cannot write 5,000 words on an argument for bipolar disorder in Ulysses' Molly. Even if I could, I need a secondary text.

The new topic is "Trapped: The Gap Between Desire and Reality." It's over the juxtaposition between literal entrapment of Lois in her home in The Last September and Molly's bedriddenness. And how it relates to them both relationally, communicatively, and psychologically. An argument for depression in Lois and one for bipolar II in Molly.

A note on Elaine and Naomi.

Often I feel awkward around both.

However, Elaine and I need each other. And, in so many ways, we're experiencing the same kinds of things. Wanting to be known and connect and just have someone there, but not having "our person" there. And she and I have had an incredible amount of struggle--I remember telling a friend's mum earlier on in the semester that an act of God needed to happen in that relationship before it could be even tolerable--but the God who moves mountains deals also in hearts.

Over the past month or month and a half, she has been the one the Lord provided for me. She is not what I asked for or expected--our current church sermon series right now is "The Expected from the Unexpected." Could not be more true here.--but she has been here physically for me. That alone has flooded me with...I dunno...relief? Comfort? Humility? Thankfulness?

And Naomi. Such a lovely girl, but I am just so awkward around her for some reason. But she's also the kind of person I know cares after my aliveness. We don't have that "I must be your friend or will languish in eternal agony" like some of my other best friends and I, but she's loyal and pursues me. I know once every week or two I'll get a text asking for my schedule. A "when" not "if" no matter how busy she is.

So thank you, God.

I also had a wee chat with a guy in a coffee shop today over the existence of God (me and coffee, I swear). I wasn't up on my evangelistic game. However, I neither believe I was going to change his mind forever after it had been hardened right there and right then nor do I think that my sad answer was going to confirm his atheism. It was just good, friendly craic.

He asked me what evidence I had to believe in God.

My answer was something to the effect of my very continued life, that sometimes, you just need to believe in God because that's the only answer you have.

It isn't kosher (I would know. ex-Jew center employee) to reference your own writing, but saddle-in. I'm about to.

My senior thesis was a long work of creative non-fiction called "WaterWorks." It was a chapbook, comprised of a whole bunch of styled, structured essays over a mutual theme of water.

Several them are quite immature and silly, or at least laughable. Some are serious. Some are trying too hard. Some are too vulnerable to actually be in there (thus no push for publication), I think, but it exists nonetheless (feel free to ask after it. I'll email it over, sure).

One of my favorite pieces (though not my professors) is an etymological study behind the word "tear" (the wee eye rain, not paper-ripping). Etymology is just a fancy way to say a study of word origins. I trace it from its root and variations, then bring it from scientific to specific. I like it very much.

I bring it up because the last line of it, which I stole/based-off a line of a poem of mine I didn't want to burn, has been playing in my mind. It's rather worthless to bring up here because you haven't read it, nor would it make sense to take it out of context and reproduce it here, but I've just been thinking about it.

The image it conjures is one total, broken, tears-in-hands, collapse before the spirit of the living God. It's the moment when all you can think to pray is Lord, have mercy. 

Inexplicably beautiful and wretched at one time.

Stop. Collaborate and Listen.

It's that special time of year! No, not Christmas. THANKSGIVING!

My all-time favorite holiday. It used to be a close runner-up to Christmas Eve, but since we've grown out of our old Christmas traditions, Thanksgiving has taken its rightful place at the top.

Every year growing up, Chon and I would watch the Macy's parade for hours, then he would...well...I don't actually know where he would go, but I would get changed (usually more than once. Jansie usually called my first attempts "homeless") and ready for the day and help the women in the kitchen.

Mashed potatoes are only right one way. Once they are in mountain form, a spoon forms a crater, a slice of butter goes in, and a dash of paprika sprinkles across the top.

My food roles are cranberry sauce and stuffing. My stuffing recipe is absolutely incredible. The cranberries, though, I never get exactly right. It's a delicate art, cranberry sauce.

When she's there, Krissy joins me in our joint role of table setting. We are in charge of putting ice in the cups. That's it. It's a lonely job without her. There's nobody to hide escaped ice cubes under various table toppers with. Or roll eyes when my mother or aunt cracks a joke about finally letting us in on the family secret recipe for ice cubes. (One day, we'll get that recipe...:))

From there, it's just a mess of singing, people, food, getting trapped at the table (literally), games, pie, mass naps, food, rifling through the black friday ads, and maybe a drive down to Utica Square for Lights On.

The very best part of this tradition is the way my family collects people.

I don't remember a single Thanksgiving where I was related (or knew) everyone at my table. Friends, family, friends of family, teachers of family, random college students with nowhere to go, random church members with nowhere to go, etc. And for that one day, they are my family.

Today, we had Thanksgiving Irish Style with a few splashes of home.

The Macy's Day Parade was on all afternoon, the food was everywhere, and gathered around the table were friends, family, and a stranger. The students, who have become my friends and family; Hadden and Betty, who are a very sweet and sparky older couple who look after us and are also like our family; and Naomi, who is a friend to me and a stranger to them.

And the very best thing happened. All this was good and well, but I received two phone calls that made my day. Two of my brothers FaceTimed me. I don't know. It seems like a silly thing to care so much about, but being remembered is a big deal to me. I met my nephew Superfly for the first time (met is a liberal word for staring at a phone pointed at a sleeping baby) and got air kisses from two of my nieces. Here's a silly, unclear screen shot of my oldest brother and his family.

Jansie, too, has sent me various pictures from the day's festivities. It's a quiet year for the Odom's. The siblings are due for their Thanksgiving with our family next year, so this year was just my ma and daddy, my aunt and uncle, and my sweet grandmother.

Check out my mother's impressive edible arrangement (she really has quite a gift. At my graduation, she made my face, nosering and all).

What am I thankful for?

1. My full handful of nieces and nephews. They completely changed my family and my life. They're so itty bitty, but they've made such a dynamic impact. One they won't ever completely understand. I love them with my whole heart. And while I'm at it, I'm thankful for the technology that allows me to be a part of their lives even while I'm so far away.

2. My family. My brothers, sisters, parents, aunts, uncles, grandparents, cousins. I'm sure everyone has a wonderful family, but mine...man. Lord has blessed us.

3. I am thankful for a God who forges unlikely relationships between unlikely people and gives us the grace to break and grow with one another as we pass in and out of seasons in our lives. Freak accident friendships. The three I have in mind are with Haley, Caity, and Kira.

I know the top one's blurry, but it captures us perfectly. Always in motion. Always laughing. Always doing something ridiculous and silly and fun. Just fun. And yet, they are the first people I go to when I need to talk through matters of the soul. These pictures in particular are taken in Haley Nelle's room by her boyfriend who met all of us simultaneously. That's how we like to do things. He survived the vetting. We kept him. He's a good one, David is. 

4. I'm thankful for my amazing college friends, professors, and mentors who continue to impact my life. Rabbi, Tracy, Abby, Becca, Peter, Adam, Maddie, Anna, Carli. I'm sure there are others.

5. I'm thankful for change. Like the change of me living here, the changes of family additions and marriages of my best friends, the changes God is making in my own life.

There is no need to make a specific number for God. The rest of the list simply doesn't exist without him.

To close this incredibly long post, I leave you with the song we sing around our Thanksgiving table (hands held so nobody sneaks food. Grandma...):

Father, we thank thee. Father we thank thee. Father in Heaven, we thank thee

*Cue male family members attempts at prayer and successes at tears.*

Scrumming in Dem Shorty Shorts

Naomi is set to turn me into a sports watcher.

Tonight we started with rugby: the Ulster Ravens against the Connaight Eagles. Friendly match, friendly match, only had to use the ambulance twice.

Eccentricities about rugby in comparison to American football.

-a "touchdown" is called a "try."
-fieldgoals are called conversions.
-if you score a fieldgoal, it then becomes a converted try.
-there are no timeouts
-no body or head protection
-shorty shorts
-you  must pass the ball backward instead of forward

Then there are wee cute things like how players will hoist various members of their team into the air to catch the ball.

It's one violent sport, though. In the words of Naomi, "It's the dull thud of flesh on flesh that gets me every time." You've got to have a severe napolean complex, superman complex, or a very thick skull to participate. Yikes.

 Mid-scrum (two parallel lines of men linked together push up against one another while a ball is placed underneath the "bridge" created by their bodies. They then fight for the ball like cavemen over the last leg of mammoth).

Photo evidence of Naomi's existence

Don't Toss the Frost

Today: book hunt, read, baked goods.

Yesterday's read: The Real Charlotte by Somerville and Ross. I can't say I enjoyed it. Austen and Bronte Victorian sass and humor is one thing. Minus the kicks and giggles? No. But it's over.

Today's read. Well, first, the hunt. I had to actually locate the book I needed. Store one didn't have it. Store two didn't have it. Then, upon finding the author but not the title, I realized that I wasn't altogether certain of the book's true author. This led me to a local coffee shop (wifi access) to look it up. But, phone didn't work. Give up? Nope.

"I'm going to be very audacious and very American right now, sir, but you have a smart phone, and I need an answer."

Strangers and I bond. The author of The Land of Spices is Kate O'Brien, not Flann O'Brien (though Flann is coming up). No Alibis still didn't have the title. Funny thing, though, the library did. Go figure. It's a good read, too. Actually, fun fact, it was banned in Ireland for a time for the line, "She discovered them in the embrace of love." Scandal! It's all about nuns and daddy issues, already perfect for my intended dissertation topic.

For those asking, this is a picture of the English Department:

Home, lunch, read, cleaned a bathroom, read, dinner, read, checked  chores.

NAOMI! She came and picked me up for an evening of baking, tea, roommates, and New Girl. I so enjoy her. On the drive home, chatting over her lack of Christian friends, we discovered a mutual disinterest of alcohol and disgust at its flagrant abuse by many we know and by our cultures as a whole. It's nice to know I have an old lady friend such as myself who enjoys simply being with another person and early bedtimes.

Finally, got home for cupcakes and to prevent the demise via sink of a substantial amount of delicious frosting. That is how I came to be writing this blog with a cupfull of frosting beside me. MMM.

(Kelsey, one of the students, joined me in my rescue mission)

Tomorrow's blog promises stories of the Folk Museum and a night out on the town with two friends I met at the Newcomers' Dinner.

A Start

I really ought to be gettin to bed, but I just have to give a wee post about this evening.

(Tomorrow or next I'll give into the past couple days of fun)

I've just got home from a "night in" with my friend Naomi. No, she's not someone I met this past week in orientation, she's a real life friend.

How did we happen?

Once upon a time, my buddy Kyle went to a school in Ecuador. His first grade teacher was a missionary by the surname Deering from Northern Ireland. Then, years go by and Kyle attends John Brown University, later to accompany a group of Family and Human Service Majors (and one minor) to Northern Ireland for a month, where he reconnects with his teacher.

On the Sunday he was to have lunch with them, he took me along. At the Deering home, I met Naomi, their daughter. Post this event, I added Naomi on Facebook only to never become accepted. :(

A year goes by.

Then, I get a facebook message out of the wild from Naomi, saying she'd seen something on Kyle's wall to suggest that I was to be in Belfast over Christmas (no idea what she saw) and that if I were to be here in September, she'd love to show me about.

This was in May, and I fully expected nothing to come of it. However, we continued to chat over the summer and, finally, hung out for the second in-person time ever. And, it should be noted, that she gave me my first hug since getting to NI . If you know me, you know that's an unreasonably long time to go without.

She picked me up, we went over to her auntie and uncle's, and drank tea, watched tv, and chatted. It was just very lovely and felt so normal, like we'd been friends all along.

I am so thankful.

What's funny, too, is that I've taken to introducing myself here as Ruth. No reason in particular except that I've always really liked my middle name. That makes us Ruth and Naomi.

This isn't my land or my people. We share a common God, but that's about all. Thus far, though, I feel like the biblical Ruth did toward Naomi. She had no one left but her, and she was willing to trust that following Naomi was worth her trust.

Knowing that there's someone in this country that cares about me personally changes things for me. I have someone to show me what's what, bake with me, watch stupid american sitcoms with me, eat pumpkin, and live life alongside.

Sound like I'm being a little far-fetched for a first date? Obviously, you've never been desperate for a friend. Furthermore, our friendship is also a little far-fetched, which leads me to believe--similar to my being here in the first place--that God's got a handle behind it.