Fall Into This Circumstance...

How excited am I for 2020 to finally get here? I feel like I haven’t been this excited for a new year since 1999, just because I liked saying that we were going to party like it’s 1999.

Twenty years on, life seems to have taken all of these turns and shifts and bends in the road to deposit me precisely back at who I was at 21. Insatiably curious, desperate to do all the things, and feeling like all of life had finally turned out like I wanted it to. College was a long, hard road of lonely for me-in all of my years at Muskingum, I had exactly one good friend, and mostly got along much better with my professors than my classmates-but by 1999, I didn’t care. I was “becoming who I was to be” (a quote that I stole from my favorite teacher of all time, Mr. Frank) and all I did was read and write and watch a lot of movies.

The past four years have circled me back to that same girl.

4 years ago, staring down the very last few weeks of my marriage before my divorce was final, I had a definite idea of what I wanted to happen- I wanted to let go of the past, to move forward in some healthy way, and to eventually meet the actual , true love of my life that surely God intended me to meet. To my mind, the only way that any of the pain of my marriage ending would be worth it in the end would be for me to realize that Nick had somehow been all wrong for me all along. The truth, I told myself, would feel so much more amazing for having lived so long with what turned out to be a lie.

Of course, that hasn’t been how any of this has worked out.

The only person that I’ve gotten to know better in the past 4 years is that girl that I left behind at 21. When Nick came along, I (quite naturally, I think) sort of shoved that girl aside. My life became about creating this family that I had always, always wanted. My life from 21 to 36 was consumed by Nick and the girls and being the mother and wife that I felt that they needed. When people talk about music or movies or anything from 2000 until 2015, I have little recollection of it. My life was made up of tummy time and Sesame Street, breastfeeding and precious little sleep.

I’m grateful every single day that I met Nick Johnson and I mean that with every beat of my heart.

But I’m also grateful every single day that I have found that girl that I let go of at 21. I’m grateful to have all of this time to read and write and watch all of the movies. To be my own best company. To just be alone, and have it be enough.

My word for 2020 is release.

We’ll see how it goes.


"It's gotta be a strange twist of fate
Telling me that heaven can wait
Oh, I'm gonna get it right this time
Life doesn't mean a thing
Without the love you bring
Love is what we've found
The second time around."
-Olivia Newton-John

Top of the World...

"Feeling my way through the darkness
Guided by a beating heart
I can't tell where the journey will end
But I know where to start."
-Aloe Blacc


I’m working on a better answer for people when they ask if I’m dating.

When a completely well-meaning person asks me that, my instinct is to worry that they are about to suggest a date. Or a dating app. Or what have you.

Then, of course, I usually stumble all over the actual answer, which is a simple no, and say things like, it’s not like I haven’t dated at all in the past four years (lest they think there is something wrong with me), and then stumble into how I’m really not looking to date right now.

All of that is true. But I say it all slanted and weird, and usually the person ends up assuring me that someday I will meet someone.

I then smile politely and often say something equally awkward and eventually, praise hands to God, the conversation ends.

The truth about me and dating and love and all the things is just a bit more complicated that I can go into in a simple conversation.

I’m not sure that the true answer is incredibly complicated, but my answer to this question never seems to be what people are searching for.

The hand-on-my-heart, true answer to this question is that I enjoy spending my free time with my girls. My life when the girls are home is filled with old television shows and books and Barbie dolls. It’s my preferred way to spend an evening.

The second truth to why I’m not all that interested in dating is a bit more complicated. I truly believe with all of my heart that I am going to meet this person who I will magically know is the perfect person for me. (I really do have a physical checklist for this purpose.)

Then, of course, you have to take a step back from that and say, in all seriousness, “but, Joy, you already thought that.” And you are correct. In my lifetime, I have loved one boy ever, and he checked all of those boxes, and all of life was exactly what I wanted for fifteen years, and then it was all a lie.

It’s a hard, hard reality to live with- the notion that I believe to the depth of my soul in true love and soulmates and Nora Ephron movies, and then to juxtapose my divorce and my complete and total belief that it was necessary and correct and the best thing for both of us.

The most truthful answer to this question is simply, I am waiting for the guy that checks all of the boxes for me and the girls, the guy who meets all of my romantic comedy wish list needs, and who understands that I have scars that are still healing.

I quite likely set the bar too high for anyone to reach for a reason. I’m well aware of that. But, for now and likely the near future, that is my truth. Even if it takes too many awkward words for me to say.

"So wake me up when it's all over
When I'm wiser and I'm older
All this time I was finding myself
And I didn't know I was lost"
-Aloe Blacc

Contradictions and Complexities...

Late fall is full of contradictions-the weather can’t quite make up its mind, the threat of icy roads is dangled as a possibility more than I would like, the trees are barren branches but it is still quite warm on my walks at night, the dark confuses all of my sense of time and I mostly want to curl up in bed with a book by 6 o’clock every night.

Late fall still brings to the surface mostly lovely memories-memories of falling in love for the first time, and memories of becoming a mother (which for me was the culmination of a million dreams come true), memories always of the lead up to Christmas, which is of course also my birthday, so it is indeed my most favorite day of the entire year.

Four years on, those memories are all mostly just truly lovely. That’s one of those truths that I wish I had understood in the beginning. That eventually you are able to remember mostly the good, mostly the magic, mostly the fun parts. It’s not that I have forgotten the painful parts. But four years ago, remembering the good just brought to the surface so much that I didn’t want to deal with-was it always a lie? Was I remembering everything wrong? When did it shift?

I don’t have the answers to those questions, and I’ve come to the conclusion that I likely never will. But I have learned, in my slow as a snail way, that it doesn’t truly matter.

Things I Have Loved Lately:

The Lazy Genius Podcast Episode 131: The Perfect Thanksgiving Turkey

I. CANNOT. RECOMMEND. THIS. HIGHLY. ENOUGH.

Nick’s leaving created all sorts of holes in our lives. One of those was that Nick always made the turkey for Thanksgiving. Thanksgiving was always a joint effort on our part, Nick and I together made most of the food that my family then shared at our Thanksgiving meal. (My mom makes the pumpkin pie, my Grandma makes Betsy’s most favorite Cherry Jello, and my sister, bless her heart, makes the crescent rolls.)

I had absolutely no idea how to make the turkey. And then I found this recipe. Kendra (aka The Lazy Genius) is indeed a genius about the things that matter, and lazy about the things that don’t. This recipe makes a delicious turkey with an absolute minimum of fuss. IT. IS. THE. BOMB.


Dolly Parton’s America

The girls and I adore Dolly so much. This podcast is a bit different, and it took me a minute to grasp the point, but ultimately I’m really enjoying it. I will admit that when the girls and I went to Dollywood a couple of years ago, the irony was not lost on me that I was spending over $200 for the three of us to enjoy a theme park that is built on the idea that Dolly grew up with a coat of rags and nearly starved to death one winter. But at the same time, I see what she has done for the area that she grew up in, how she has lifted them up- it is, of course, the dream that I hope that everyone would have, the ability to provide a life for those around them. To encourage literacy and development and all the things. I will always love Miss Dolly.


Meg, Jo, Beth, and Amy: The Story of Little Women and Why It Still Matters

This was an interesting read for a bit of a Little Women superfan, which indeed I am. This book explores not only the well known biographical trope of Louisa’s use of her own family as the model of the four girls, but also explores adaptations of Little Women and its place in the literary cannon. I could quibble with a few of her own personal opinions, but mostly it all holds together nicely. She picks apart different characterizations, spends a good deal of time on the idea that it is Katharine Hepburn’s Jo who we all remember, as opposed to some of Jo’s actual character-after all, she does ultimately marry. And so what does it say that that was the ultimate goal, even for headstrong Jo?

(My own personal favorite of the Little Women is Beth, who is contented and happy at home with her sisters.)

The girls and I are anxiously awaiting the new movie, along with a million other movies that seem to be about to drop. Betsy is in complete love with the new Disney+ streaming service. We have been watching Christmas movies and reading all the books (we have well over 100 Christmas books). Enjoying so much our evenings in.

“If it’s dark, put it in park.” That’s our motto for this late fall. So far, it’s been fairly glorious.

The Road to Xanadu...

“In Xanadu did Kubla Khan
A stately pleasure-dome decree:
Where Alph, the sacred river, ran
Through caverns measureless to man
Down to a sunless sea.”
-Samuel Taylor Coleridge


On Wednesday, Felicity came home from school sick. Thus, I became that stay-at-home mom that I used to be for a day (which I do miss from time to time, back when my babies were babies and my life was just wholly centered on them- life has moved so far from that now, and it’s as it should be, but it is nice to go back sometimes).


Felicity slept and played with Barbies, while I did laundry and read my book. And then she declared that we needed to watch something. Which was a tricky proposition, because Betsy hates to be left out, and so we had to chose something that she wouldn’t care that we watched without her.

And so we landed on my most beloved Xanadu.

Here is the thing about Xanadu: I am super well aware that it is a mucked up mess of a movie. The actual storyline is terrible and mostly boring. When we start watching I always start to question why exactly I love this movie, because it starts slow and Michael Beck is woefully miscast as the lead.

But by the end I’m always so charmed that I want to start watching it all over again (I did make poor Debbie listen to the soundtrack 3 times the next day).

There’s just something magical about what is basically a 1940s musical updated to a late 1970s roller skating, glittery disco. Gene Kelly is in roller skates! Olivia Newton-John is at her most fabulous, singing songs that would go on to become some of her biggest hits. There is a Don Bluth animated short in the middle of the movie!

It all makes up for the complete and total lack of a coherent script, and the lack of any kind of chemistry between Michael Beck and Olivia. If only John Travolta were opposite the love story would at least seem believable. I read that Olivia had tried to get Mel Gibson for the role, which would have been just amazing, but alas, this is what we have.


I'm not one hundred percent sure why Felicity always loves the movies that truly tend to make the least sense that I love (she adores Return to Oz, which is genuinely one of my most bizarre favorite films). But I'm so grateful that she enjoyed spending her afternoon with her mother watching a movie that was dated and old even when I watched it for the first time.

I'll take all of the sick day, magical disco roller skating moments that are still left with my girls.

The One With the Spreadsheet...

This weekend for me is going to be about cleaning and reading and watching the scary movies that the girls refuse to watch. (I can't convince them that Scream is a treasure and that they are missing out.)

BUT...

Someone, somewhere, decided to start the Christmas movies tonight. Even I, most avowed lover of Christmas ever, think it's a bit early.

In any case, however, I did indeed create my spreadsheet of all the Christmas movies from tonight until New Year's. And so, dear blog reader, I share because honestly spreadsheets are my love language and I would love for someone else to enjoy them as well.

(You will also notice that the Christmas Very Brady Renovation is there too. Again, we are geeks.)


Christmas Movie Spreadsheet


My own personal Christmas movies will begin on Halloween, when the girls and I indulge in all the candy and watch The Nightmare Before Christmas. It's a most beloved tradition.


Happy Halloween and Merry Christmas and all the things from this most nerdy, Type A girl :)

Through a Glass, Darkly...

Sometimes words fail me.

Nothing frightens me more.

Words, after all, are the only thing that I had to cling to for such a while.

But recently I have had a season of silence.

A season of starting to write and having the words come out all slanted and wrong. A season of struggling to find the tone, the shift, the texture of what this space is holding just now.

Life has changed this year, this year that I dubbed the year of trust, this year in which nothing of consequence has happened at all. My life is still divided into all of its corners, I’m still that girl who believes so much in what must be magic-nothing at all is different, and yet I feel so very changed.

Grief, they tell us, is not linear. Grief does not end. Grief simply morphs and changes until we don’t recognize the weight of it anymore. (If we are lucky, of course.)

Every night that I am able, I walk. Outside. Around corners that I could navigate blindfolded. When you live in the same place for 40 years, you carry the bends in the road in your step, in your soul. And so, every night I reach the top of the same hill, the hill that is what I will always consider “my hill,” the hill that I climbed at the age of 10 and declared to God that I would never, ever leave. And every night I think about that little girl, and about all of those dreams that she held tight.

All of the important dreams came true, I tell her.

There has been too much sadness lately. Too many people that I care about have lost loved ones, have realized a bend in the road that they weren’t expecting. It’s tripped them up. I want so much to tell everyone-this is how I did it. This is how you survive grief. But, of course, I cannot.

Grief is not survived. It is lived. I am still-still-four years later living the grief of a broken heart, of what it means for someone’s words to be a lie. It’s crazy and maddening.


I made a lot of room for grief. I wrapped myself up in it like a blanket and held tight to it.

This year of trust has felt truly like I’m not doing much of anything-just living and holding onto my girls as tight as I can and reading and writing and all the things. After four years of trying to become a stronger person, a person more sure of herself and her worth, right now I’m just holding steady. Enjoying this moment in time, where I am the mother of two girls who still enjoy spending their free time with me, where I am the daughter of parents that I get to see every single day, where I’m defined just as Joy.

Trust seems to have been about figuring out that all of that is just enough.

Pretend It's Stars Hollow...

Council Mondays are not my favorite.

When I first started working at the Village, all of my co-workers bemoaned Council Mondays and how crazy they seemed. I must admit, after three and a half years of working here, their theory bears out-anything weird that can happen does on Council Mondays.

But, that being said, I had a weekend full of things that are my favorite (with the exception of the girls being with their dad-never a favorite-but I have learned through four years of this being alone every other weekend thing to plan a lot of stuff-keeping busy, especially with things that I enjoy spending time doing, is the key (quite literally) to sanity).

Peanut Butter Falcon

This quiet movie is one of my favorites for the year. The screenplay was specifically written for star Zack Gottsagen, who has Down Syndrome, and it is quite pitch perfect. I’m not a huge Shia LaBeouf fan but this movie might have made me one.

Maybe You Should Talk to Someone by Lori Gottlieb

Lori Gottlieb is a therapist who finds herself needing therapy after an extremely painful breakup. (Most anything that is a true story about an extremely painful breakup is on my radar to read, always hoping to glean some kind of best practice for how to move on from a broken heart.) This is a non-fiction book, so to say that it was eye opening is an understatement. As an advocate for therapy, I feel that for nearly anyone in therapy or considering therapy, this should be required reading. She pulls back the curtain on both her own therapy and some of her clients that she has been given permission to share. I cannot recommend it highly enough.

Waiting for Tom Hanks by Kerry Winfrey

I’ll preface by saying I liked the idea behind this book better than the actual writing, although by the end I was charmed by the story. The writing could use some tightening. But I freely admit that I love rom coms, especially ones written by Nora Ephron, and Winfrey is trying her best to spin a romance around that specific love-it’s harder to do than it looks, and some of the writing is clunky as a result. But the story is set in German Village (The Book Loft is one particular setting) and as a total romantic at heart, I enjoyed this story.

1619

This podcast is blowing me away- it is profound and amazing and all the words to mean I am forever grateful to be learning so much. Episode 3, which dropped this past weekend, “The Birth of American Music,” is fantastic- I wrote an essay in college about cultural appropriation of R&B in the 1950s and rap music in the late 1980s and early 1990s that was one of my favorite essays ever to write (mostly because I love music and this was an excuse to listen to a lot of it). This podcast is in the same vein, and filled with music (I do adore yacht rock). It’s the bomb.

I also got out all the pumpkins and watched the Buckeyes win and the Browns lose and the most amazing Rafa Nadal win his 19th grand slam title and watched Serena just lose her grasp on her 24th. All in all, a weekend with slightly more good than bad (though my Browns did manage to crush my heart-I have a feeling that I will always and forever love the most the people who hurt me the most in the end).