So in keeping with last week's plan to write about Seattle, I've condensed my experiences on the west coast to five major points, lessons I'm glad to have learned during that season of my life.
1. I faced the darkness, both metaphorically and literally.
On the literal level, Seattle is one of the darkest cities in the country. During the mid-winter, the sun doesn't come up until nearly 9am, and sets well before 5, and even then, it's usually hidden by a low swirl of gray. Sometimes I would go for stretches of two or three weeks without seeing the sun.
For a sensitive soul like mine, the darkness was crippling some days. It was cold and dreary, and my spirit felt as cloudy as the skies. Though, as I mentioned in my last post, I made some dear friends in Seattle, I was also very alone some days, away from my family and closest friends.
But just as eyes in a dark room find their focus by even the tiniest sliver of light, I sought out the one light source I'd always known, pressing into my faith, even though God felt as far away as the rest of my loved ones. I looked to scriptures and prayers and sermons as my footlights in the dark, and when it finally grew warm and sunny again, I was more grateful than anyone.
2. When the sun finally came, I never missed an opportunity to soak it up.
People always associate Seattle with the rain, for the exact reasons listed above. But what Seattle-ites like to keep secret is the fact that when the sun does come out, "Rain City" becomes "the Emerald City." Summer days in Seattle are long and idyllic, with the sun staying up until almost 9 and the air reaching a perfect, humidity-free 75 degrees. Gorgeous flowers and fields of tall green grasses blow in perfect breezes, as a city previously imprisoned by rain and gloom comes out to play again each spring.
After the long, grey months, I, with the rest of Seattle, took as much advantage of the sunny summer days as possible: camping, hiking, kayaking, going to outdoor concerts and movies, and picnicking all over the city.
Of course, the metaphor for life continues here as well: just as I learned to seek the light in the darkness, I also learned to never take the sunshine for granted. In the past 30 years, I have had many low moments and plenty of disappointment, but my time in Seattle taught me to cling to the promise that the sun will always shine again. Some stretches of cold and gray may seem to go on forever, but inevitably, a beam of sun will push its way through the clouds and summer will arrive again.
3. I had some incredible adventures and took some awesome road trips.
Aside from my big trips to and from Seattle, which took me through national parks (notably, Redwoods, Yellowstone, and Grand Canyon) and major U.S. cities (Santa Fe, Las Vegas, Los Angeles, San Francisco, to name a few...) I had always wanted to visit, I made so many incredible memories on overnight and day trips in the northwest. Some of my favorite excursions:
- A weekend ferry trip to Orcas Island.
- A spur-of-the moment drive to Vancouver for the last day of the winter Olympics. Though we didn't catch any events in-person, we feared for our lives as the minority Americans watching the U.S. v. Canada Hockey finals surrounded by Canuks in a dive bar, and caught the closing ceremony fireworks before heading home at midnight.
- Two visits to the Skagit Vallet Tulip Festival
- An epic week on the road in Oregon with the one and only Antointette Michelle which included way too many flights of beer at the state's many craft breweries, a trip to Crater Lake, my first view of the Pacific ocean via the Oregon Coast, and a visit to the Oregon Shakespeare festival.
- A trip with the afforementioned bible study girls to Sacramento, CA for one of the most fun (albeit a bit sweaty) weddings of my life, book ended by winery tours in Oregon on the way down and a pit stop in Redwood national park on the way home.
- Multiple concerts including the Sasquatch Music Festival at the Gorge in Eastern Washington.
- Skiing in the Cascades.
- The most epic day ever at Mt. Ranier National Park with my SCT intern crew.
4. I tried new things I was too afraid to do before.
The great thing about moving to a city where no one knows you is that you can be whoever you want to be and do things you never would have tried somewhere else.
Though I was a theater major in college, I actually only performed in one non-Children's theater production, largely because I let myself get so intimidated by other students I thought were more talented than me that I didn't even audition.
But in Seattle, with no one I knew to compare myself to, I finally went for it. I was in two productions in my time in Seattle-- a community theatre production of Beth Henley's The Miss Firecracker Contest, for which I dyed my hair bright red to play a wannabe pageant queen, and The Odyssey at Taproot theater company, an ensemble show in which I played several parts including a queen, a siren, and, my personal favorite, a slaughtered sheep.
It was a joy to finally be onstage again, and it motivated me to put myself out there again when I returned home.
Perhaps one of the most challenging and memorable "new things" I tried in Seattle was teaching a theatre class at a men's homeless shelter. I had always had an interest in applied theatre, or the use of theatre in non-professional or academic settings, so through a connection at my church church, I started leading a weekly theatre class for the "guests" at Seattle's Union Gospel Mission, in the heart of downtown Seattle. It was a terrifying, challenging, and at times emotionally overwhelming experience to attempt to share my art form with such an unfamiliar population, and I ultimately ended up finding it too difficult to maintain any consistency in instruction with the changing dynamics of the group. But for the few men who did keep coming back, I think the class offered at least a sliver of hope, a chance to imagine possibilities beyond their current realities, and I grew immensely as both a teacher and a human from my weekly interactions with them, interactions I never would have had if I hadn't given it a shot.
5. I grew. A lot.
Personally. Professionally. Intellectually. Spiritually. In every way, my two years in Seattle shaped me for the life I have now. Though things felt sort of all over the place at the time, looking back, I can see how God was working out my future every step of the way. My internships and crazy freelance teaching artist jobs taught me how to adapt in any classroom, and also built an appreciation for the more steady, though equally crazy, work I do now. And though it took me a few more years to work through some of the personal/spiritual things I started to unearth in Seattle, I am forever grateful to have had those years alone to begin to work out the process of self reflection, growth, and acceptance that I'm still discovering today.
Ultimately, Seattle did exactly what I predicted it would when I first set off for the west. It pulled me out of my comfort zone, which is exactly where growth occurs.
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