Elemental

31 weeks left
22 weeks completed
5 weeks left until mid-tour leave
0 Pounds lost (This is a most impressive number! I’ve been traveling for the last two weeks without diet or scales to track what I was certain would be backwards progress…Is there such a thing as “backwards progress”? Hmmm…discuss amongst yourselves… At any rate, nothing gained is OUTSTANDING news to me. Well done, body. Well done.)
25 pounds total
13 months until the wedding

One of my favorite phrases has always been “in your element.” I love it when people refer to others (or themselves, actually) as being in their element. It means you’re good. You’re happy. You’re doing just exactly what you are supposed to be doing, and better still, you’re doing it well—you’re *good* at it. And people can see it. What a great way to feel about a person or yourself—to recognize what you’re doing as being just the right thing or in seeing another work in a capacity that truly makes them happy and fits. (Isn’t this everyone’s life wish ultimately? Don’t we search our whole lives to figure out what our element is, and then go live there in it?)

More than the fact that I have always just generally loved the connotations of the phrase, is the fact that its origin is a complete and utter Sherlock-Holmes-type mystery to me. Where does it come from? Why do we say it?

I mean, I know what element means all by itself (with special thanks, yet again, to my bff Professor Webster):

1 a : any of the four substances air, water, fire, and earth formerly believed to compose the physical universe b plural : weather conditions; especially : violent or severe weather s> c: a constituent part; the simplest principles of a subject of study : rudiments d : the state or sphere natural or suited to a person or thing

Ok fine. The first three seem to make some sense to me. But the last definition (and the one I’m most concerned with here, actually) seems sorta like an afterthought, not really related to the other meanings at all. Elements = substances. Right. Elements= weather conditions. Ok. Elements= small building blocks or rudiments. Got it. But randomly, the word takes on a totally different nuance with the final definition: the natural state suited to a person or thing. Am I the only one missing the connection as to how this last one fits?

I looked and looked on the vast and always-full-of-nothing-but-total- truth interweb. Annnnnd nothing as to where it had come from or why we say it. I asked all the smartest people that I know if they knew where the phrase came from. And summarily, each gave me a detailed recount of their interpretation of its definition. This was of course interesting, but not particularly helpful. Because I know what it has come to mean. I just don’t know why. And because the question of being in one’s element has been at the forefront of my noggin in recent weeks, not knowing why has come to be a little frustrating to me.

For the last two weeks I have been on the road (for a refreshing change of pace?) and have been without reliable internet or phone service. I have been *very* far removed from the hustle and bustle of the East Coast where I reside, and have been living life the much simpler, Midwestern (country) way. For the first few days of the trip, I was actually camping with some friends in the deep woods, in a place that is almost fairy-like to me in its separation from reality. When I was there, I was literally living in THE elements. Which interestingly enough, made me feel like I was in MY element (as I really am an outdoors, country girl deep down beneath the urbanized, jaded, too-fast moving adult I have become.)

So does being in YOUR element, mean being exposed to THE elements? Is that where it came from? That can’t be right… because I know a GREAT number of people who would not feel at all comfortable in THE elements, or *any* element really other than, say, the Plaza Hotel (we’ll call those folks Eloisian. And bonus points for those who know why.)

So I guess that’s a definition of being in THE elements, but not necessarily as being in YOUR element (though, for me, it sorta is one in the same…just to confuse the issue further…) (An aside: While doing our state park camping time, a friend of mine commented that “Camping people are the last bastion of hope in the United States. Where else do people just live randomly together in a community of total strangers, completely reliant upon mutual respect of belongings, safety, and looking out for one another and each other’s stuff?” This thought has stayed with me. I think it’s a good question. I’d welcome rebuttals. But only from those who have, you know, *actually* been camping before.)

I moved from being in the elements home to the small town in which I grew up, and spent time with my father and my best friend from youth. It is fairly clear to me that that place can no longer be considered “my element” as a whole. I’ve moved away and grown and changed. And while I will always find comfort and familiarity and love there, it is not the place any longer in which I am best suited. (You can’t go home again?)

That said, there was no action more fundamental and very very right; no love more rudimentary…so, completely elemental, than spending each night I was home sitting on the couch of my best friend, her two young children (whom I am sad to say I see only sporadically) comfortable enough with their crazy auntie to crawl right up on my lap immediately upon my entrance to the house, bring me a book, and cuddle down for the evening bedtime story. Here again, I felt I was in my element. (And can I just say, that when we said our evening prayers, and her 4 year old prayed for her Uncle J to come home from the Stan safely to me, I could not control my tears.) Maybe a love that is pure, that is elemental, is a prerequisite for being in your element. I think it is for me.

For a part of this two week trek, I was helping to run a school reunion (yes friends, I’m old enough to not only start ATTENDING reunions, but helping to plan them as well.) And I like people. And I like planning. And I’m good at that sort of thing. But after about 48 hours of dealing with crazy logistics and adults with schedules and plans that weren’t *quite* happening as they were intended, I was a little burnt. Late in that third day, I found myself with the opportunity to sit down and just chat with a couple of teenagers who were currently attending the school. At this point in the weekend, as I started to ask these girls about their lives, their plans, their hopes and fears, my body relaxed a little bit, and a smile more real than I had produced at any other point in the weekend spread across my face. A new friend, someone I had just met, who was sitting with me as I chatted up these young girls, smiled and made the off-handed comment as they walked away: “Wow. When you’re with kids…you’re really in your element.”

In and of itself, the statement sorta went over my head. I wasn’t really thinking about it or paying attention to it at the time. But since I got back from my trip, I’ve pretty much thought about that comment non-stop.

In a time in my life where I feel like I am so desperately searching for what’s next (and where’s next…and how’s next…and if’s next…etc. etc.) having someone point out for me that working with kids, engaging them in conversation and listening; talking and learning and guiding and helping; that when I was doing that, I was in my element…well, it was a hugely helpful insight to me. I’ve always known deep down that it was true, but to have someone who hardly knew me say it to me out of the blue, just reinforced it for me. I consider that comment truly a gift in a time when I am trying to be open to signs from the universe for direction in what I do next.

And so I might not ever know the origin of the phrase or why or how it’s come to mean what it does. I guess I’m going to have to let that go. But as I continue on my journey to find my own place in this world (insert Michael W. Smith tune *here*) it’s nice to know what the phrase has come to mean in my life: I’m in my element when I am surrounded by nature, surrounded by children, and surrounded by love. And that, my friends, is a pretty sweet set of fundamental building blocks to start with.