My second favorite movie is the original Jurassic Park. As of this writing I’ve probably watched it thirty times – including this summer at the drive-in. What a delight! COVID has mostly been an inconvenience, but it has snuck some good things into my life as well. One of these being our local drive-in, without any new releases to show, has been playing some oldies but goodies. On the night of Jurassic Park they also played the original Jaws. It’d been a while since I’ve watched Jaws all the way through and I forgot about how gory it was. I loved it! My daughter, son-in-law, and I went canoeing the day after watching Jaws and, even though we were far from the closest ocean, it still made us a bit fearful that we were soon going to hear the famous music start and have our boat be bitten in two right into Bruce’s mouth.
There are pieces of movies that make them my favorite. Jurassic Park’s very quotable line is one I quote all the time, “Life will find a way,” from Jeff Goldblum’s character, Dr. Malcolm. I feel it’s fitting whenever weeds relentlessly grow in my backyard rock patio no matter how much “weed barrier” we lay down. Shawn and I overhauled the entire backyard between last summer and this summer. It was a mess of twenty-three years of neglect. We have it looking awesome now, but no matter what I do, I still have to go through and pull up weeds. Life will find a way is also fitting whenever I survive something that could (figuratively) kill me – a strenuous bike ride, a stubbed toe, or too much pizza at one sitting. The best use of life will find a way is whenever my husband finds something that he’s looking for – this is challenging for him when that something is under another something. I quote this a lot.
The second piece of Jurassic Park that helps make it my second favorite movie is when Sam Neill and Laura Dern’s characters, Dr. Grant and Dr. Sattler, see the real dinosaurs for the first time. (I hope this isn’t a spoiler – I mean, the movie’s been out since the nineties so hopefully you’ve seen it!) I like to sit and imagine the wonder that they felt seeing something with their own eyes that they never thought possible. They had studied and supposed and hypothesized all of their adult lives about dinosaurs, yet, knowing the laws of extension, they never dreamed they would know definitively about anything. And, when they see the dinosaurs, it’s truly a religious experience.
I grew up taking an intentional vacation every summer. Usually we went camping or to the Smoky Mountains. (I know God exists when I’m in the Smokies – but that’s a whole other blog post.) One summer we came into some money and got to go to Disney World which was as magical as advertised. Shawn and I followed the same vacation family time while raising our kids. Shawn’s not one for being dirty so we rarely camp but we’ve gone to some fun places – including the Smokies several times. We’ve even made the magical trip to Disney a couple of times. Shawn and my daughter, Keyanna, aren’t huge fans of leaving home so my son, Nathan, and I have gone several places just the two of us. One memorial trip was to the Grand Canyon. When I caught the first glimpse of the canyon I started weeping. There was no other appropriate response for me. It is that beautiful! When we walked from our hotel room to the south rim at night and witnessed the stars it was a religious experience, not quite Jurassic Park level, but close. Every once in a while I want to get in my car and just drive to Arizona, a la April and Andy style (Parks and Rec), to witness it again. Now that the kids are older we don’t do the intentional vacation any longer but instead sneak away for a weekend here or there and often go with our friends on a long weekend somewhere close-ish.
Shawn has always had a pretty hard stance that he’ll never leave the country. Even taking it as far as when we went to Niagara Falls a few years ago, we stayed on the boring America side. Of course, we didn’t have passports and didn’t want to become permanent Canidians so that had something to do with it as well. In December, 2018 I was busy having my mental breakdown when Shawn saw that his favorite band of all time, Aha, was going to come out of retirement and tour Europe. On Christmas Day he looked at me and seriously said, “Let’s go.” I confirmed that he was serious, serious and I booked airline tickets the next day (before he changed his mind. This was a good thing because he changed his mind a lot of times before we actually got on the plane.) And, that’s how we ended up doing a two-week tour of Europe in November, 2019. I love planning a vacation almost as much as I enjoy going on one so this trip provided the best distraction to the mind work that would overwhelm me at times during 2019. We ended up in Iceland, Paris, Germany, and Switzerland. I studied French all through high school and when we decided to go I started using Duolingo to brush up on my skills. By the time we left I was a decent broken French speaker. It took forever to get there and when we finally landed in Paris we were exhausted not having slept for close to 24 hours. Our first full day we took an Uber to the Louvre. I had researched the crap out of this trip but for some reason I didn’t look into any small details about the Louvre. The place we were dropped off didn’t line up with any of my knowledge of where the entrance was and we spent a few minutes wandering around lost. Shawn doesn’t like to be lost and he also had a strong “not safe vibe” about all of Paris. Once we found the entrance and all was well he was still freaking out and kinda being a jerk. I was overwhelmed by jet lag and the wonder of it all. Standing outside the entrance of the Louvre it hit me. We are in France which is an entirely different country and across an ocean I’ve only dipped my toes in once in my life in America. I stopped and breathed in, and that moment was a Jurassic Park level religious experience. This was a place that I’d studied about and known about all of my adult life, but never once did I even dream that I would be standing at the entrance about to go in! I tried to explain this to Shawn in my effort for him to understand that he needed to calm down and allow this experience to happen. We made it in (with a funny line story of how my French skills immediately failed me) and spent the next ten hours experiencing something that my heart couldn’t even hold. It was wonder and delight and magic and religious and I wept three different times. The entire trip had wisps of these adjectives but that first day at the Louvre, a place that I’ve always known exists but never thought I’d see, was the best part. A few days later Shawn getting to see Aha in Paris and Germany, with his own eyes, was his Jurassic Park level religious experience.
I’ve always been a person who “struggles with weight”. I swam competitively in high school and I think all of that physical exercise kept my weight down but it wasn’t something that came naturally. I teetered on plus size clothing when I got pregnant with my daughter twenty-three years ago. Following her birth and for the twenty-two years that have followed I’ve been some version of “plus sized”. Most days it truly didn’t bother me as I was so much more concerned about many other things to be concerned about my weight. I love(d) food and literally ate whatever I wanted. I could still move and do the things I wanted to do. I didn’t realize then that my left knee cap popping in and out of joint wasn’t normal and that breathing heavy after walking a block didn’t have to be my reality. I learned how to bring my sugar back up when I was experiencing a hypoglycemic attack, how to always have a bottle of Tums available, and avoid the shaming that came from doctors at all costs. I used food to fill an emotional hole in my life, but I fully acknowledged I was doing it, so I tricked my brain into thinking it was okay. I resigned myself that I would always shop in the tiny section of the store that offered plus-size clothing. It wasn’t even that I resigned myself – it was more that this was the only reality that existed. A friend of mine on Facebook started posting about her weight loss journey a couple of years ago. I was interested but it wasn’t something I ever thought about doing for myself. In 2018, I started Keto and was able to lose thirty pounds. I gained ten back then lost them again. Basically this was the story of my life. While not being overly concerned about how much I weighed it was something I periodically thought I should get a handle on. In my life I’ve done (and spent lots of money on) Jenny Craig, Weight Watchers, Adkins, Nutrisystem, Grapefruit diet, Egg diet, Intermittent fasting, and Keto. All of these diets would allow me to lose a small amount of weight but I’d quickly lose the willpower, go back to my unhealthy ways, and gain it back. In all of my adult life I’ve never been below 200 pounds.
Then, I had a mental breakdown, and everything changed. My body literally stopped functioning and said if you don’t do something different, right now, you are going to die. Everything about me at this point was unhealthy – my mind, body, soul. The real me – the big me – wanted so badly to stop being quashed. My true self was tired of being medicated with people pleasing, de-selfing, sugar, alcohol, and countless other things I did to fit into the small person I was programmed to be. I spent 2019 working on my mind and as an overflow of a healthy mind I began to dream for the first time in my adult life. What if life could look different in all areas than what I’ve ever experienced? Toward the end of the year I remembered Christine and her weightloss journey. Without telling anyone what I was doing, except for Shawn, I reached out to Christine to start on the plan she’d been using to succeed. When I started with this current plan I weighed 242 pounds. During my intake with Christine, she asked me, “If failure isn’t an option, what would you want to weigh?” I told her if I could get to 200 pounds I would be happy. According to the medical professionals a healthy BMI for me means I weigh between 145-150 pounds. Believing there was no way I could get there, I decided I would be happy being 199, a weight I haven’t been in twenty three years. As of this writing I weigh 179. It hasn’t been an easy process or without temptations but my body and mind are so happy to be healthy and big that everyday is worth the work. When my plus sized jeans wouldn’t stay up any longer I went to Target and bought a pair of “regular people” size 16. I brought them home, tried them on, and they were too big. I returned them for a size 14 and that moment in the Target dressing room was a Jurassic Park level religious experience. I was wearing non-plus size clothing. On a body that was below 200 pounds. What?! I’d worn plus size clothing for twenty three years. My whole identity was wrapped up in being the “big girl” but being okay with it and “loving myself whatever size.” My Jurassic Park level religious experience in that dressing room was half elation and half terror. I had to spend two therapy sessions fleshing out the feelings of terror in order to be okay with my non-plus sized body. I went back to the car that day and cried. Getting my mind healthy meant I now felt every feeling without the numbing power of anything. Just feeling. I’m going to keep going and get to that healthy BMI sized body. Then, because I’m working mind, body, and soul, I’m planning on being this size forever. The freedom that comes from a healthy body is amazing. I can get on the floor and get up with no effort, I ride my bike miles and miles, I hike in nature aimlessly, I sleep amazing, I forgot Tums exist, haven’t had a hypoglycemic attack in months, and I was brave this morning and went for a blood test to see how my body is functioning.
During this whole time I’ve still been working on my mind with therapy, self-improvement reading, slowing down and actually feeling every feeling, and meditation. I’ve come to discover that out of the overflow of a healthy mind and body can come a healthy soul and I recently quit church. (My father just rolled over in his grave!) I haven’t quit forever but I’ve quit for now. The majority of what I know about religion and God comes from my fundamental evangelical upbringing. Until recently I haven’t questioned anything about my religious beliefs but now I find myself wondering if I truly believe something or if it’s something programmed in me long ago. A famous phrase that I’ve been taught and programmed not to question is, “(The religious belief I’m wanting you to blindly believe) is in the Bible.” My healthy mind, body, and soul are no longer blindly accepting, “It’s in the Bible,” as an answer for anything. I’ve come to realize that blindly accepting religious beliefs is close minded which is the complete opposite of the open and curious lifestyle I’m now embracing. Closed mindedness has kept me small long enough. I’m taking time to examine everything I’ve learned and holding it under the microscope for truth. This season of unlearning and relearning has been incredibly liberating but also equally painful. Jesus and I are still good. However, I’m taking a long break from religion. (I am currently in the midst of this season of soul work. So, I feel the need to add this is all subject to change.)
Thus far my biggest take away from this season of life is that living and learning and changing and growing last until the good Lord takes me home. During my childhood I was taught that it’s selfish to care for or love yourself. This is one of the first lies to be unlearned. Neglecting any part of my being only fuels unhealthiness and when I’m unhealthy I’m not living anything resembling my best self. Ian Cron, author of The Road Back to You also has a podcast, Typology, that I listen to often. He was recently talking about when you are your best self you’re actually closer to God. His reasoning is that God created you to be a certain way and when you have so much crap in the way it keeps you from the authentic person that you’re created to be. My fundamental upbringing is afraid of the phrase, “Be your best self.” In my experience, fundamentals hear that and translate it to, “Living without any God influence and therefore bad because humans are flawed and cannot be trusted.” Or, it’s because Joel Olsteen wrote a book with a similar title. Every fundamental is very afraid of Joel Olsteen.
The first time I watched Jurassic Park I immediately thought of Heaven when they were experiencing dinosaurs on earth. I imagine waking up in Heaven, a place I’ve learned about and dreamed about but cannot see, will be a Jurassic Park level religious experience. Jesus said (in the Bible — but I know where and why) that He’s the only way into Heaven. Won’t it be funny (not haha but ironic funny) when we get to Heaven and Jesus greets us and asks, “Why did we make it so hard?” All the weird rules, prejudice, nationalism, entitlement, judgement, patriarchy, and angst weren’t what life was supposed to be about. It was just Jesus. I have so much to figure out and so much to know. I’m okay, though, because it’s going to be an awesome journey filled with wonder and delight.
Oh, and my first favorite movie is Apollo 13. When I have a {l o n g} life lesson from that movie I’ll write that blog.
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