a celebration of union

It started in a Land Rover. 

The first dozen times the old beast of a machine got stuck in a mud rut, my job was to encourage and hold the wrench – it was in that mud that love’s seeds were first planted. Over time, the seeds germinated and blossomed and I said “yes” to “will you marry me” and soon we were taking our first look and exchanging vows and cutting ice-cream cake.

In five years  since, we’ve made a life overseas, establishing a home out of a mud bricks and a ministry out of grass roots. We've combined our DNA to create three lives and have had the privilege of rearing one.

We have spoken harshly and gently, encouraged and forgiven. We have held the mirror up to the other, revealing and refining our true selves. We have adventured and risked and come home to roost. Partner, spouse, friend, beloved we have called each other.

This is our marriage and it is a gift. We still kiss in Land Rovers, and thankfully get stuck a lot less.

Happy Anniversary to my loving husband, Jeremy Michael.

living simple, living small

I don’t function well amidst clutter. I can’t work. I can’t think. I can’t sleep – not if there are piles of things laying where they don’t belong. Sometime post-college and after I started living alone, ordering my surroundings became a hobby. I’d arrange and rearrange my few belongings and all of life would be put on pause if something disrupted my sense of order.

After getting married, Jeremy and I had to work out our “stuff” related issues. While Jeremy is not nearly as OCD as I am, he still values an uncluttered life, particularly given our limited square footage.

While living simply and living small is par for the course in rural Zambia, we've noticed that many of our American friends struggle with the desire to downsize. Hip designers have rebranded small homes as “space efficient dwellings” and Pinterest has taught us a thousand new ways to creatively store all our crap. There are clearly ways to shrink your life, and yet... THE STUFF. The real struggle doesn’t seem to be in the floor plan or in finding clever storage cubbies. The battle for simple and the battle for small is waged primarily at point of purchase.

This is something Jeremy and I learned early on, cohabitating inside a petit abode. With every pending purchase we stopped to ask, “where are we going to put it?” We knew that if we were going to live unencumbered by junk (or treasure) we had to be diligent on this point. And for the most part, it has not been that hard – especially since, truth be told, there isn’t that much stuff to buy in the Luapula region.

We are able to contrast our Zambia life, however, with the  consumerist culture that so totally dominates America. Even in the few weeks of sojourning in America every year or so, we absolutely feel the marketing pressure coming from every direction telling us to buy more stuff and put it in a suitcase and haul it back to our too-small house in the bush. Every blessed time we have traveled to the states we have said, on the front end, “I don’t think we’ll have much to carry back this time…” And then we end up stuffing our luggage to max capacity. Why? Because America is flashy and we are weak and the struggle is real.I may or may not have lugged 50 lbs of Wegmans across the ocean in May. 

Staging our own form of intervention, we've given extended thought as to how to conquer America, how to stick to our guns, to keep living simply, and to keep living small. We're developing habits now that we hope will serve us well, particularly if we ever move our of Zambia and into a first world country. To share with you all some of what we've come up with, I’ve compiled here a list of ideas and tactics that we use somewhat in Zambia, but particularly in America, to combat the compulsion to buy stuff and expand storage and clutter our lives.

14 habits to develop towards simple and small living

1. Develop the mental discipline of NOT comparing. Size, quantity, expense, niceness. None of it. Comparison is the gateway drug to both discontentment and justification, both of which inevitably result in shopping therapy.

2. Turn off the TV and put the magazines down. It is near impossible to look at pictures of beautiful people and all their beautiful things without lusting after it all a little bit.

3. Change the question from, “Can I afford it?” to “Can I live without it?” The answer to the first question keeps your bank account in check, but the second keeps crap out of your closet.

the living room. that's all she wrote.

4. Make penny pinching a game. An albeit weird game, see how little you can possibly spend this quarter and then try to beat your record next quarter. Every time you pass up a sale or go without the upgrade you get to squeal, “I’m winning!”

5. Don’t celebrate how much you saved – celebrate how much you didn’t spend period. Similar to number 4, but with a twist. Many bargain shoppers love to purchase items that are on sale just for the thrill of the 50% off, not because they needed that item. Garage sale-ing is perfect for finding a very specific item but is clutter suicide when you’re just hunting deals.

6. Budget like a fiend. If all the pennies are “locked” into another category/account/budget line item, they just aren’t available for unnecessary purchases. Revisit the flexible areas of the budget often to see what else you can trim down and throw into savings – or generous giving which brings me to my next point:

the play area.

7. Find excessive amounts of joy in giving money away. When you commit to tithing a certain amount and giving regularly to charity or missions or child sponsorship, that money is less likely to be used on stuff for the basement. Establish biblical convictions about tithing and stretch your limits. Consider increasing your giving amounts each year. Don’t know where to give? Choshen Farm is a FANTASTIC option.

8. Engage the one-in-one-out rule in as many areas of your life. Fine, buy the new dress, but another one has to leave the closet before this one comes in.

9. Set time limits on unused items. Haven’t golfed in 5 years? To Craigs List the clubs shall go.

10. Seize the moment. That irrational/angry moment when you look around and feel like you are a candidate for hoarders? That’s when you need to go on a rampage, throwing out everything you don’t use without thinking twice about what ends up in the trash or donate bin.

the homestead at a glance.

11. Find accountability amongst like minded friends. Talk about your shopping habits and confess your materialism. Play the penny pincher game with your besties and surround yourself with people who are a positive influence – not a stumbling block – in this area.

12. Determine in advance which will be your bulky or splurge items. We built an entire separate building to house our king sized bed so that we could bed share under the same mosquito net. No qualms there because it was intentional and right for our family.

13. Hand write the values/priorities/mantras that will keep you in check.  “I value storing up my treasures in heaven,” “no new shoes until we are debt free,” “where moth and rust will not destroy…” Write it, post it, ponder it often. And as a way of creating a less materialistic vision for your life… (see 14)

14. Spend more time in the Bible letting those thoughts dominate your own. When you are compelled to mission, sacrifice and God’s glory, everything on Amazon just looks so much less attractive.

the culinary corner.

What about you? What tips can you share for cutting down on the clutter and living simply and small?

welcome to the amatebeto

This week we had the privilege of attending an amatebeto with some of our neighbors. The Malisawas were celebrating 35 years of marriage and the family had arranged a special amatebeto presentation for them. An amatebeto is, in short a massive presentation of traditional foods. Historically, amatebeto’s are given on behalf of a bride’s family to the groom’s family. Overly simplified, it is a way of saying “See? We can cook really, really well. Your son will not starve.” Better explained, it is also a communication of respect, deference, admiration, and commitment. Because food is so deeply significant in this culture, a beautiful presentation of all the foods of the land is like saying, “We give you our best, we give you our all.” It is touching and significant.

In recent years, amatebeto’s have been given as a way of honoring couples that have remained married for many, many years. And it was for this reason that we all gathered together with the Malisawas. I desperately want this tradition to be introduced into American culture. (I’m pretty sure the Colvins would love a spread of all of Mama Rawson’s delicacies.) And so in case you are planning a 35^th wedding anniversary celebration for someone near you, or maybe you want to hold on to the idea for yourself, I’ll share the whole day with ya’ll right here.

The ceremony was held in a shell of a building (the one we hope to rehabilitate to make a second preschool – but that’s another post for another day.) The couple entered in looking sharp. And serious – because just like in Zambian weddings, the couple is not supposed to smile. (Every once in a while you’d see their lips turn up but they obediently tightened them back down.)

And then entered in the food. Dishes piled on top of each other and wrapped in fabric, carried on top of the ladies heads which they sang and danced their way into the gathering area. The drummers beat wildly and the audience hollered with delight.

One by one, family members stood to give tribute to the couple. Their messages contained words of gratitude for the example the couple has set over many years of marriage. For staying together through thick and thin, year after year. And for giving the clan nine children.

I just have to pause and explain how fascinating these tributes were. Every single person that stood and spoke thanked Mr. Malisawa for the nine children. An alien would have thought that men were the ones to birth and raise children because not a single person addressed Mrs. Malisawa in their  praise of the full quiver. From my “good wife training” I know that women are supposed to kneel and clap and tell their husbands that they are hard working stags after a round of love making. All of the male-centered congratulations during the program only confirm the cultural conviction that children are born of sperm and manliness and the women’s contribution is really not all that. (All the more reason why we are pushing for more men to be present in the delivery room. It’s time they knew the truth.)

The other interesting thing is that all of the members of Mrs. Malisawa’s family told Mr. Malisawa that after 35 years of having him in the family, they have decided he is a good man and can now call him brother. To any one in the States dealing with in-law tensions: you have no idea. A young groom basically lives in fear of his in-laws for decades as he proves himself a worthy man. He lives amidst the bride's family never speaking directly to his in-laws, never eating in the same room with them and constantly watching his mouth and actions lest the in-laws hate him, expel him or end him. For 35 years this man has been on the chopping block and finally the cleaver has been laid to rest and he can breathe.

Jeremy and I also gave a tribute of which there is no picture but suffice it to say that we never fail to entertain, particularly because when we dance, people roll on the ground like hyenas. (I credit all of this to Jeremy who looks like he’s driving a large tractor when he dances. It’s epic.)

After all the talking, the family comes to present the food to the couple. The women displaying the food must lay on their sides on the ground before the presentation as a symbol of respect. The dishes are brought to the front, unwrapped and one by one and presented to the couple while everyone sings a delightful rendition of “See the food! See the food! See the food!”

Chicken, fish, beans, vegetables, groundnuts, sweet potatoes, mushrooms – the works – it’s all laid out until the couple has seen it all, everyone has rejoiced and the whole village smells like delicious. And then we eat. And everyone is happy.

Bronwyn was deeply moved by the ceremony which is why she slept through half of it and spent the rest of the time hanging out with Timo and asking people for beans.

I'm pretty sure she's trying to talk him into running away with her. forever.

I’m telling you. Our five year anniversary is in a few weeks which means Jeremy only has 30 more to go before he is in good with my family and we can present him with Mama Rawson’s cinnamon rolls and pork tenderloin and super supper skillet. And Ya’ll are sure to be invited.