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a night at the Boulevard, watching the Olympics. photo by Erin Rufledt

There are times of life, I am convinced, that are conducive to different art forms. There are long, rooted sorts of seasons that are like contemplative novels, others are better suited by poppy dance songs, self-deprecating cartoons, or haikus.

Today, I decided that this is a snapshot season. Not only does my moving-every-week rhythm have the same choppy, spontaneous quality to it of a random photo album; actually, my life is just beautiful and quirky in the way that sets up the best photos like a winning volleyball spike. How many times a day do I wish I could focus, blink my eyes like a camera’s shutter, and wind up with the image before me in an album?

It’s funny that I say this nearly two months after returning from the city many people consider to be the most lovely, charming city in the world, don’t you think? The thing is, though, that I see my hometown and all its characters differently now than I ever did. Oh, Kansas City! Rich in color, texture, full of cowtown charm!

Just now, I’m wondering if my urge to snapshot these things is deeper than just the prettiness of everything. Life is all full of change, everywhere I look. My close friends are getting hitched so fast the marrieds are now outnumbering the singles. Some have moved away; I plan to. Meanwhile, my family is getting ready to sell the house my sister and I grew up in the suburbs, and the houseful of ladies I have called my own is breaking up. To prepare for this double-whammy move, I’m clearing out old clothes and ratty kitchen gear by the boxful. This process is extra-pressured because I’m also working up towards a season of transient farm work in the French countryside, starting in the spring if all goes well.

Friday afternoon, I sat outside a Crossroads storefront with two of my dearest friends. We lounged in vintage chairs and couches, feet propped up next to a cow’s skull. The sun lit us enthusiastically from low in the sky, as if preparing itself for its own TGIF night on the town. Behind us, in the store, were a dozen local farmers selling their produce; to our right rose downtown Kansas City. It was a simple moment, but it was thick with the substance of place and friendship.

Can’t I just capture some of these moments? Can I take this precious time with those I treasure and put them into tiny form, Polly-Pockets or holograms to someday reproduce this? For whatever reason: Nope. I can’t take even a paper-thin slice of this and develop it for another day. Even real photographs, on thick, matte paper can’t bring this back.

Carpe diem it is, then. Not just for the sake of “living it up.” I guess that while I am tempted to hoard these times like a million vacations photos, I suppose doing so would trivialize them in the same way. A moment lived well is dear because it doesn’t come back.

So let’s throw out the Hulu and the Netflix, set the alarm for good and early in the morning. Let’s dine together, walk together, help each other pack and move. Do that thing where you make drinks to sip during a movie, then get so wrapped up in conversation over the cooking of the popcorn that you end up plopped in the living room all evening, movie forgotten. Linger in the kitchen, seated on the countertops; talk through your toothbrush about your day’s triumphs. Because it’s the last of this.

the changing of seasons

Well, hello, July 28. I quite like anniversaries, and today is one. It’s one month since I left Paris. I crept out of a quiet apartment before dawn on June 28th, slid out of France on a train, glided out of Europe on a jet plane, and found America, resplendent in her rocking chairs, friendly service, and soft bodies ready for hugs. 

Many people, myself included, have been concerned about my transition. While for most of us, it seems completely normal and right for me to be here, I’m lucky to have good friends who care how I’m feeling and how the second giant change in a year is affecting me. 

Blanket response: “I’m glad to be here.” 

There’s something funny about these short-lived experiences abroad. When I’ve come home from stints in France, I’m often asked to compare what I think of as “my two countries”—a natural question, I guess, but one that also breeds a sort of anxiety in me. Why? I end up feeling like I have to choose one or the other. You’d think that somewhere, I hide a checklist of what I like best in each place. I don’t. 

“It’s not better; it’s just different:” the slogan thrown around by the exchange agency I went to France with at 18. It’s a phrase that gently changes your paradigm away from comparisons that can lead to anger, frustration, and bitterness—not just with your host culture, but also with your culture of origin. 

These days, I still agree with this point of view. But this time around, I don’t feel that pressure. I’ve been working to eradicate that dualistic view from my mindset. On the other hand, there’s a larger principle that is at play here. 

 It has to do with seasons. Go figure: being back in Kansas City, I’m also back to gardening, back to the land. Staying at the house where I’d lived and gardened before moving to Paris, I get to once again enjoy the fruits of this plot of dirt. Luscious tomatoes, crisp greens, fragrant herbs are all a few footsteps out the back door and totally abundant. There’s all I could want of them. Similarly, a trip to the farmer’s market proved that oodles of peaches and more pounds of watermelon than I could carry are affordable enough to eat to my heart’s content. 

 In the middle of this process, I started reading Animal, Vegetable, Miracle by Barbara Kingsolver (READ IT). In essence, she shares about how her family chose to eat only off their own land and from farmers they knew for one year. She has beautiful and hilarious insights into, well, everything. I’m keeping notes. The thing that caught me today was this. She’s talking about the importance, and the ultimate tastiness, of eating food that’s in season, namely watermelon. I quote: 

 “But it’s actually possible to wait, celebrating each season when it comes, not fretting about its being absent at all other times because something else good is at hand.” 

So true, about watermelon, tomatoes, and the like. They’re better fresh, in season than out of season. Delightful. Sublime. They are worth waiting for to eat in their prime. 

Then I thought about life. One thing I’m proud of is that I lived those 10 months in Paris like there was no tomorrow. In relationship and in adventure, I savored that city, that country. It wasn’t always easy, but I tried to live it for all it was worth. 

Then I came home. What do these months in Kansas City look like? In a nutshell, simplicity: work, learning, teaching, and being a friend. I’m also skin-on-skin with Kansas City in a way I’ve never been, now that I’m getting around on foot or on bike in this sprawling mess of a city. My prayer is that I would love and engage with Kansas City as well as or better than I did Paris. I’m loving the re-discovery of its smells, its heady humidity, and the textures of crumbling asphalt and dry-crackling grass. With loving looks at sherbet sunsets and awkward interactions with the population around me, I’m celebrating this place and the season that has me here. Waiting those months to come home to Kansas City and the people I love here has made it sweeter to me than it has ever been before. 

Being away has freed me, somehow, to truly love. On the other hand, as I fast from France, I learn to love her more deeply as well, and her absence from me is making my heart fonder for her and her people. And so I find myself in the trial towards contentment. I love what is before me in all its splendor, knowing the next season will hold something different, but equally delicious.

Merci

 Mes amis, 

Je vous écris de Kansas City, de la maison où j’habitais avant de partir. Depuis quatre jours, je retrouve ma famille, mes amis les plus proches, le jardin qui avait été à moi, tout dans l’été chaud et fructueux du Midwest américain. 

Et je pense à vous. Quel cadeau de pouvoir partir, de devoir partager et résumer ces 10 mois (même pas) passes à Paris! Je me rends encore plus compte à quel point c’était bon, riche, nourrissant, redempteur, surprenant, et beau. Je suis remplie de gratitude envers Dieu et envers vous, parce que vous étiez ses outils guisés et tranchants pour faire des choses merveilleuses. 

Pour ceux qui étaient à ma fête d’’à bientôt,” j’avais partagé mon histoire avec la France, qui est une bonne petite histoire qui prend du temps à raconter. Ce n’est pas trop la peine de la dire ici. Pourtant, je sens que je dois insister sur les remerciements. 

Merci de m’avoir accueillie dans vos maisons, dans vos cafés préférés, et dans les endroits que vous aimez partout dans Paris. Avec vous, j’ai découvert Paris comme elle est en vérité--et donc j'ai pu l'aimer en vérité aussi. Maintenant je change les perceptions de Paris qu’ont la majorité des gens avec qui je parle. Ils me demandent si c’était dur et froid; je dis non, au contraire, c’était ouvert et chaleureux, et j’ai connu beaucoup d’amour. 

Merci d’avoir été généreux. Certains m’ont invité à manger, à boire un café. D’autres m’ont offert des petits cadeaux opportuns ou même m’ont passé une enveloppe avec du liquide dedans pour me bénir ou m’encourager. A chaque fois, je me sentais vue, apprécié, et affermie dans ma place et mon appel pour la France. Ensemble, vous avez contribué aux cadeaux choisis pour me dire au revoir. C’est fort de faire ça. 

Merci d’avoir prié pour moi et de m’avoir encouragé et défié. En faisant cela, vous vous êtes joignés à moi, m’ont donné beaucoup de sens et de valeur. 

Merci également de m’avoir donné de la place dans vos vies, de m’avoir partagé des choses profondes, des réflexions ou des questions que vous vous posez. Souvent, quand je discutais avec vous, je réalisais dans le moment que c’était un vrai privilège d’être permise dans vos vies personnelles et, parfois, de lutter ou de travailler à vos côtés. En plus, c’était tellement fun ! 

Vous êtes des trésors, et je suis si contente de faire partie de vous. 

Très sincèrement, 

Maggie 

My friends, 

I write you from Kansas City, from the house where I lived before I left. For four days, I’ve been seeing my family, my closest friends, the garden that had been mine, all in the hot, fruitful Midwestern summer. 

And I’ve been thinking of you. What a gift to leave, to have to share and summarize these (not even) 10 months spent in Paris! I realize even more how good, rich, nourishing, redemptive, surprising, and beautiful it was. I’m filler with gratitude towards God and towards you, because you were his sharp and piercing tools for doing wonderful things in me. 

For those who were at my goodbye party, I shared my story with France, which is a good little story that takes time to tell. It’s not worth it to share it here. Still, I feel like I must insist on the thank yous. 

Thank you for welcoming me in your homes, your favorite cafés, and in the places you love all over Paris. With you, I discovered Paris like she really is--and therefore love her as she really is. Now I’m changing the ideas of Paris that the majority of people I talk to have. They ask me if it was cold or hard; I say no, on the contrary, it was open and warm, and I knew lots of love there. 

Thank you for being generous. Some of you took me out to eat or for coffee. Others gave me little gifts at the right moment, or even passed my an envelope with cash inside to bless me or encourage me. Each time, I felt seen, appreciated, and affirmed in my place and my call for France. Together, you contributed to gifts chosen to say goodbye to me. It’s powerful to do that. 

 Thank you for praying for me, encouraging and challenging me. In doing so, you joined yourselves to me, and gave me lots of meaning and value. 

Thank you also to have given me a place in your lives, to have shared with me deep things, reflections or questions you’re asking yourselves. Often, when I was talking with you, I realized in the moment that it was a true privilege to be allowed into your personal lives, and, sometimes, to fight or to work at your sides. And, it was so fun! 

You are treasures, and I am so very glad to be a part of you. 

Very sincerely, 

Maggie

moutains and/of gifts

 Two separate people felt God gave them a picture for me about this year: a bunch of presents, large and small, waiting to be unwrapped. As my 27^th year came to a close, I got to unwrap one that was what we call in French gigantesque.

As a family, we drove south 8 hours into the lost, wild mountains called the Cévennes, where a friend of ours has a pair of eccentric uncles living in an 1890’s château on a rugged couple of hills. Medieval-like towers peeked out from the treetops at the top of the mountain as we drove in, and a fountain surrounded by little yellow flowers trickled tranquilly in the courtyard.

Etienne, our friend and a hell of a tour guide, accompanied me through the place right away. Room after room was elegant and yet worn, filled with the likes of threadbare chairs and faded books, enigmatic carvings and second-rate portraits.

We were there to live life for a few days with all willing friends involved in the Paris house-churches. Throughout the weekend, activities were proposed and received—walks up to the abandoned village on the next hill over, making elderflower syrup, and prophetic dance in the fireside room. Otherwise, we sat hours at breakfast together, telling stories and dunking bread into our now-lukewarm hot chocolate. Some slept all morning. We prepared meals for hours and consumed them with good conversation.

As for me, I felt more in my place than I’ve felt almost anywhere. At home, I relished in the morning sun streaming into my tower bedroom. There was a ramshackle library above that looked out on the mountains around, and it felt like my favorite little scene from Disney’s Beauty and the Beast, adapted to my life. Outside, a world of wonders beckoned from early in the morning. I enjoyed sweet moments that I can’t help but describe:

One afternoon, I grabbed a tome of early 18^th-century fairy tales (illustrated by Gustave Doré, and the engravings were much nicer than the stories) into a hillside meadow. Under the southern sun, with a cool breeze, I enjoyed a mediocre story until I became sleepy, and then I took a nap amid wild thyme and clover. Waking, I spotted cherries on some trees further down, and found they were ripe. I picked a few that had already been touched by the birds, and cleaned and savored them.

Another day, I took a walk into the hills behind in the late afternoon. It was cool and solemn in the shade of the woods. Uninhabited houses and empty stone buildings contributed to this sense of eeriness. Then I reached the sunny side of the hill, and caught the illuminated landscapes on the hills across the way, complete with the distant barking of dogs and bleating of goats. The smell of cedars and acacia and goat dung melded together and it was like I was walking among goat cheese and honey.

The morning before we left, the eve of my birthday, it was raining steadily. Still, I had resolved to go out and pick heads of elderflowers to take back and prepare in a syrup. So, naturally, I tucked the pant legs of my pajama pants into my Chuck Taylors and went out anyway, since it wasn’t cold. No one else was out, to my knowledge; if they were, they got a very funny show. I ran and laughed and stomped in spongy, drenched grass as I sought out the ripest flowers, and I got thoroughly soaked. The grounds were beautiful in the rain and thunder, especially because it’s a dry region and rain is truly a Godsend.

It was here, too, that I think I fell another floor (or two) deeper in love with France. The natural earthiness of the place combined with the relational goodness among us all, under the presence of a very-present God. It was powerful and simple—a stunning, unexpected birthday present.

For more photos of this week, go here and click "diaporama" at the top right.

harvesting the wild

Once again, we’re on vacation. This time, as in October, we’ve trekked to the Lausanne, Switzerland metropolis to visit Jonathan’s parents, after stopping for the weekend in hilly Burgundy with a couple of friends.

The golden moment of that weekend was a morning I spent with the two older kids. We headed down a country road behind the house, overlooking wide, sprawling hills of grass and bright yellow canola, just now fully flowering. The wind was sharp and lively, but the sun was benevolent, and so we set out on a hunt—for what I didn’t know, but there is always something to find in spring in the countryside.

Before long, we had discovered that the dandelions were up and beginning to bloom, and that the lilac was spreading its fragrance all around. While the children rushed down the road on bike and scooter, I stopped frequently to greet old friends: the stinging nettle, dandelion, blackberries, clover, and wild onions. Soon, with a little playacting and genuine interest, I wooed the kids as well to the hedgerow and began to remark and explain the various plants. They picked specimens of many things and plopped them in a white plastic bucket we found by the toolshed.

All the way down to the bottom of the hill, it felt like paradise. I was firmly in the middle of my calling. My own marveling, sensing, moving, teaching, were all in action and serving to enthrall the three of us. We plopped down along a row of blooming trees full of birdsong to make dandelion chains, and the siblings were still delighted. So what if, not long after, as lunchtime approached, they began to fall apart, and by the time we reached the top of the hill again, I had a tearful two-year-old on my hip? It was worth it.

Here in Switzerland, I’ve had similar moments alone in the woods (my “work” this week consists of taking a two-hour walk each morning with no-longer-tiny Siloa slung on me in the scarf). Again, I’m strangely invigorated by the presence of wild plants. I remember how I fell in love with foraging in my back yard in Kansas City last year, making smoothies with young dandelion greens and salads with violets and their greens.

There’s something so thrilling to me about the richness and diversity of nature. I can hardly believe that some of the most nutritious plants on earth just happen all by themselves, in abundance seemingly impossible to deplete. Yet, it seems so right.

Let’s take the stinging nettle, for example. While it’s a plant you sometimes pay with pain to consume, it’s utterly worth it, being rich in vitamins A, C, and K, iron, calcium, and protein. Plus, it’s been clinically proven to help out with problems of arthritis, PMS, and urinary tract infections, along with many other illnesses.* And it tastes and cooks up like slightly more aromatic spinach.

So, we’re harvesting tons of free greens this week, and cooking them up in a couple different kinds of soup. The essentials in harvesting nettles are to either use sturdy gloves or scissors and some craftiness of gesture, and to use the youngest, tenderest leaves—a good strategy is to decapitate the top four to six leaves, if you have lots of them at your disposition. Should you find yourself in the woods, tool-less, you can try this technique with your bare hands.

To rid the nettles of their sting, you can certainly boil them for a few minutes in water (conserve the water and drink it with some honey for a healthful tisane; don’t you dare waste that goodness!). Or, if you’re going raw, you can supposedly soak them overnight in water; it also might work to totally blitz them with a food processor or juicer.

Some ways you can cook with this lively weed: soup, pesto, scrambled eggs, green smoothies, and juice. A little internet search will show you how to do any of these if you feel lost.

So, my friends, I commission us all to get out to the edges of our yards, fields, and forests, and make friends with the wild. Try a free sample. Embrace the nettle… er… maybe not literally.

*For more than you ever wanted to know about nettles, visit this site.

o happy spring!

Happily, Paris has transformed into a balmy spring paradise, or close enough. Well-tuned eyes will find not only arms and legs newly liberated from weighty winter wool clothes, but puffy white and pink blooms busting joyfully out of branches and busy bees about their work.

Suddenly, since temperatures have risen and color has returned to us all, my near-daily morning trips to the little park behind the apartment with Ionaelle have become much more enjoyable than the obligation they had been these last months.

Part of this is simply that it’s my nearest source of “nature” beyond the rosemary plant clinging to life on our cramped balcony. If I focus, really focus, on the fuzz of the sage plant, or the ochre-yellow sycamore-bud casings, it’s possible to forget that cement and asphalt and metal are on every side. I remember that the Lord is such a quirky, creative maker, and that there’s goodness in everything, and this simple reminder is like blood in my veins.

The city itself is not without goodness, though, in spite of its innate grayness; we must take into consideration that it is rich with the divine comedies that are our human lives and the intricacies of their intertwinings. In fact, I honor this city as a place where people-watching is a valued activity, and quite well-practiced. It might be Paris’ strongest suit.

At the park, thankfully, I don’t have to sit back and passively watch all the time like most grown-up Parisians spend their time doing. Kids have a marvelous way of pulling adults into their worlds, but also of breaking down walls between those who care for them.

For months, Ionaelle and I have been hanging out at the park behind the house with a four-year-old stud named Hugo, and he’s just my favorite. I love how he brags about his bike and leaks personal information about his home life. I love how he exasperates his Indian nanny by wanting to stay longer, always longer. I love the way he speaks to us in funny, somewhat lispy, British-French-Kid English, the way he wants to play “catch-catch,” and counts super loud—sometimes while banging on something metal. Most of all, I love the tender hunger for love and approval that pulls beneath the surface.

One particularly springy morning last week, Hugo broke the law by picking the heads off of some daffodils. When his nanny scolded him, he told her they were for me (“la dame,” the lady, he called me). I have to admit that it warmed my heart even though it was probably just to get himself out of trouble. After all, it’s not every day a lady receives flowers from a handsome Frenchman.

A couple of days ago, we had another sweet, only-with-kids moment. Lilia, our friends’ daughter that we watch on Tuesdays, was with Ionaelle and I. She’s got a particularly innocent, almost fairy-tale quality to her. That day, as soon as we entered the park, Lilia ran to a group of three pre-teen girls from the rough local school that were hanging out on a bench. In her little magenta coat, she just stood there and watched them with delight. Each of them began to interact with her, and then with me as I walked over to join them. The same thing happened with two other groups of tough older students; I was amazed to see how they responded—baffled but flattered, I think—to her silent but close observation. It felt like her free curiosity opened a door that I was able to walk through and offer the gentle grace of Jesus that I carry in me, as well.

Oh, bless springtime! Bless it because it melts the ice. Bless it because it warms what was frozen and wakes what was dead. Bless it because it quickens activity; bless it because it awakens love. And bless the little children, because the Kingdom of Heaven belongs to such as these.

a real gem

One beautiful thing about living in a big city is that there are people everywhere, all the time. "How is this beautiful?" you might ask. While being surrounded by others all the time has its challenges, at least one never has to get bored. People are inherently interesting. None are alike. Yet, I would argue, some are more intriguing than others.

This fellow caught my fancy recently as I accompanied Eliakim to school one morning. Clearly he had carefully considered his wardrobe: pink and red elements were combined creatively, down to a red American handkerchief serving as a pocket square. At the same time, he had this feeling to him of one who is missing some marbles, or perhaps has some too many.

Naturally, I pulled out my phone and pretended to dabble on it, while in reality snapping his picture. When we got off the bus, I glanced down at the paper he was writing on, spotting wild squiggles or something of the kind, and I wondered what kind of genius he might be.

Therefore, I'm sharing him with you as if it were the sharing of a goodie, a treasure. Because that's what people are.