I know I’ve mentioned in previous posts that I am conquering my fear of flying.

That’s a lie.

I’ve conquered my fear of leaving the window shade up while flying. I’m still absolutely terrified of flying. I just hate the feeling. I hate the rockiness of turbulence and the constant threat of the fall.

A week ago I began a trip to Africa to spend my summer teaching aboard a hospital ship called Mercy Ships. My trip included three different plane rides – the shortest of which was three hours long. The longest was seven.

Ignoring the fact that I was heading to Africa for seven weeks and that this is not something most 20-something teachers do with their precious weeks of summer vacation, I tried my best to get some sleep on the flight over. I made it about 30 minutes before we hit turbulence and my mind started checking the nearest exits in case of emergency. I also started debating how long I could swim.

And so it continued like that, on and off, for the remainder of my trip over the Atlantic. Turbulence. Panic. Imagination overdrive.

It’s just something about the fall.

I hate the threat of it.

When this trip presented itself, I pretty much jumped. I jumped last summer as well. And when accepting my current career path. Even with my fear of heights I cliff jump. I like the exhilarating feel of the jump, just not the lack of control accompanied with the fall.

I made it over the Atlantic with nothing more than a few gut checking dips of the plane, but I still feel a bit like I’m operating in imminent fall mode. Something about this place is unsettling. I guess that’s exactly what I was looking for. Something that wasn’t easy. Something that would challenge my plan – my life. I just thought it would feel a lot more like jumping and lot less like a free fall. I thought I would have some choice in the matter. Right now it feels like I have no choice. My world is being turned around on me and I’m not getting much say in the matter.

I’m not quite sure where this trip is going to take me. Whether I’ll return the same or go home and make alternate life plans. I don’t know whether I need a big push off my big comfortable life to make a change or whether I take another leap of faith all on my own.

But I do know this, with falling or jumping, the general premise is the same: at the end you have to have the faith that something will catch you before you hit the ground.

I’ve noticed spontaneity is a rare and precious gift these days. With work and other commitments, life tends to take on a rhythm that I don’t think much about altering because responsibility calls. Between my regular work schedule and things to get done at home, free time fills up fast.

But recently, I was served a good and healthy dose of reckless abandonment that I thoroughly enjoyed.

It had been a crazy week at work… deadlines, multiple late nights, working through lunches, and very early mornings. I was running on empty by Thrusday night when I got a call from my boss… which in my case is my dad. He said, “Hey, you’ve been working a lot of hours. Take tommorrow off.”

A weight was lifted, and I thought, Dost my ears deceive me? I get the entire day off? So I double-checked… like an idiot.

“Are you sure? You don’t want me to come for a half day and finish that project? I can…”

He cut me off. “Take the day off or I will revoke my offer.”

Done.

First thing I did Friday morning… or rather, didn’t do… was shower. It was wonderous to put on my favorite pair of jeans, favorite tank top, favorite ballcap and favorite sandals and head out the door without mussing with the hairdryer or my straightener or fixing this and that. It is a very freeing thing.

Next thing I did was meet my friend Laura at Starbucks for a morning coffee. She was in town with her husband, who had a business meeting in Indianapolis. While he was busy, she was hanging out at Starbucks, chilling with her books and laptop. I all but skipped into the store, ordered a large coffee, and giddily settled in for a long morning chat.

While I was there, my sister called me. She was in town for my cousin’s wedding and was doing some antique shopping with mom. They wanted me to meet them downtown for lunch. And since I had no schedule, I said, “Sure, be there in a minute!” Within minutes, I was on Massachusettes Avenue, the art district of downtown. It’s a quaint street with art galleries, coffee shops, restaurants and theaters. I parked and walked down the sidewalk, face to the sun, to meet them for lunch at Bazbeaux, one of the best pizza places in town.

My big sister, dressed casually and carefree in similar jeans and tank top, and my mom, always dressed in cool and billowy clothes, swooped me into a hug and we continued down the sidewalk with our arms linked.

We got in line at the pizza place and ordered way too much pizza, salads and large Diet Cokes. We found a small table outside, dumped our purses in a chair next to us, and proceeded to talk, people-watch and laugh out loud like obnoxious women. I loved every second. We decided to revisit an antique shop they had been to in the morning so my sister could take one last look around.

It was a massive warehouse filled with beautiful antique anything you can think of…. doors, windows, counter tops, arcade games, old bowling alleys, paintings, beds, toys, etc. We spend the next couple hours exploring and finding treasures for each other’s houses. a couple times, we even had to call each others’ cell phones because we got lost in the seemingly endless maze of rooms and floors.

As the afternoon wound down, I felt satisfied I had spent the day well. It was a delicious day filled with last-minute and unexpected fun. I loved not having a schedule and being able to take off when I wanted. It shook me out of my normal day-to-day plodding along to show me that sometimes it’s OK to let the responsbilities go to the wayside a bit. Sure, bills must be paid, but would it hurt to take a personal day every now and then? Let the laundry go an extra week? Make cleaning less of a priority?

Carefree, lazy and unplanned days are way too few and far between, and I hope to spontaneously have more of them.

I had fully intended to write my next piece for TOD on my vacation in Israel last week. It seemed so – well, obvious as a topic for this site, what with the country as it is and the wedding we were invited to. But then life decided to get in the way of my plans.

Right now, all I can think about is the building project my husband and I have been planning and slowly, slowly pushing forward with eight other families. We want to build a house together right in the city, with lots of kids, separate apartments and a garden to share. Everything is ready, and God knows we are, too. The planning phase of projects like this tends to be lengthy; we have been working on the project for almost two years now.

When we first entered the group, we were people in a similar situation, with small kids, looking for an affordable, green, eco-friendly and individual space to live in the city rather than in the suburbs. The group slowly grew from two to nine parties, everyone considering and being considered carefully regarding not only his/her financial background, but first and foremost whether he/she would fit into the group. This sounds much worse than it was, and the point is: These people, my future neighbours, have become friends by now. We meet once a week, and we’ve managed to make these get-togethers something I actually look forward to, despite all the things we need to organise, despite all the problems we’ve encountered on the way, despite the occasional disagreement.

But now, the dream represented by this house, the vision of 10+ children and 17 adults living together may actually plop like a soap bubble.

You see, we are supposed to buy the ground we want to build on tomorrow, the date is fixed. The machines are ready. Everything is ready, for that matter. But today, the bank decided one of the nine is not worthy of credit.

This is the impact of the global financial crisis taking its toll on our very local project. The conditions for getting credit have changed a lot in the last couple of months, and ironically, security has become the main focus of any banker, regardless the attractiveness of our project for them.

This is heartbreaking not only for the project, but also for those who have been denied the money. As I said, these people have become friends, and I can feel their pain. All of us want to see this house built, and not only that: Each and every one of us wants this house built and filled with exactly this group of people. No one else.

So right now, my husband is sending me updates by email from a meeting with the whole group in which we discuss how we can safe the project. And I’m sitting at home, praying and pleading and hoping against hope that all will be well. And regretting not to have lit a candle in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem.

Author’s note: This was written one week ago. In the meanwhile, we managed to save the project. We are building a house!

I chose my outfit carefully that morning, selecting a collared shirt and necklace that I hoped would make me look less like I might still be a college student. (One of the hazards of my job, working as a twenty-something on a college campus, is that I get asked, “What’s your major?” by my colleagues a lot.) I was meeting with the family of a retired professor who had recently passed away, preparing to be the cantor for the music at his funeral Mass. I wanted to look professional, and old enough to not give them concern.

They arrived in the conference room, mother and daughter: the wife of the professor was a short woman in a red jacket, walking a little unsteadily with a cane. Her daughter was tall, thin, with dark hair and stylish glasses. They seemed composed, which relieved me in a selfish way. I felt unprepared to handle their grief.

My co-worker, Kristi, began by talking to them about possible readings to use at the funeral. She read a first one – the Beatitudes – which they liked, and then began a second one. As she read, the professor’s wife’s eyes filled with tears. “I’m sorry,” she said. “It’s still so hard.”

“It was many years, wasn’t it?” asked my other co-worker, Kathy, one of the gentlest people I’ve ever met.

“60 years,” she replied.

As we continued, she teared up again as we discussed some possible songs for the service. She apologized again, and sighed. “I still tuck him in at night,” she said thickly, gesturing as though she were smoothing a sheet on a bed.

I suddenly felt very young, and foolish, worrying about my cheap beaded necklace and hand-me-down shirt. I couldn’t imagine the kind of connection that comes from intimacy over that period of time, and the emptiness that comes when it’s severed. I had no concept of that kind of grief. And it’s a lesson that only comes with time, and loss, that I haven’t experienced in my short life. My heart ached, nonetheless, wishing I could offer some kind of comfort.

The songs we selected were ones that you hear often at Catholic funerals: On Eagles Wings, Be Not Afraid. Songs of comfort, and hope, and promise beyond present pain. And while I can’t offer the family of a very loved man words from my own wisdom or experience, I can offer my voice. I can hope that the music of timeless words of mourning and comfort can express what I long to say. I hope that it can tap into the deep love that is the flip side of the coin of their grief. But I know, too, that it won’t be enough. One side of her bed will remain empty.

“How long do you think it takes to get over this?” she asked at one point, not expecting us to answer. I don’t think you ever do.

Note: In honor of Father’s Day, I am doing all pieces this month about my dad.

My move to California was one of the best trips I’ve ever had, and that’s because it was with my dad. I packed nearly everything I own into the back of my 1994 Volvo, and early one September morning, Dad and I set out. We had some great conversation. We listened to my iPod, which is full of music from his youth. He humored me and listened respectfully to a Barack Obama speech. The first night we stayed in Santa Fe and ate at a Tex-Mex place we remembered from a family vacation years ago, on the rooftop, relaxing with beers. The second night we stayed in Flagstaff. We ate at a crowded, noisy Outback Steakhouse. We stopped to take pictures in Texas; we stopped in traffic in Los Angeles; we stopped everywhere for gas. Dad paid for everything. And finally, when we made it to Oceanside, Calif., he took my new roommate Ashley and me out for sushi. It was the turning point for me and sushi.

I liked the trip then, and I like it now, but I expect its importance will only grow with time. Not very many women get the chance — or would want — to drive across the country with their fathers. Not a lot of fathers would cheerfully pay for the whole trip. And I bet precious few dads would be so supportive of a firstborn daughter moving 1,700 miles away to a pittance-stipend, no-security, lousy-benefits, temporary volunteer job with gangster kids. But I got to, and he did and he is.

There were a lot of lessons in that trip, and I’m sure I won’t realize all of them until/unless I have children of my own. I’ll spare you the saccharine, and focus one one profundity that resonated right away:

We were in the hotel in Flagstaff, and I was turning down my bed. I mentioned the pillows were soft, and, joking, that it would be really easy to steal one and have a nice addition to my new bed in my new room. Dad knew I was kidding, but got that annoying look that means he sees an opportunity to teach a lesson.

“It would be the most expensive pillow in the world,” he said.

He was baiting me. He does this a lot. It drives Mom nuts. But he had paid for everything, including the steak I’d just eaten, and he’s my dad, so I bit.

”Most expensive? Why?”

His answer, for once, was simple: “You would be selling yourself for it.”

Dramatic, I know. The Life Lessons of my Pops are nothing if not dramatic. But this one stuck with me, and it became a cornerstone in my work with my students. When they steal, when they smoke, when they drink or cheat or do graffiti or lie, I tell them — it seems like this is free, fun actions. But you are selling yourself for it. And if they’re paying attention, I tell them the story of the pillow.

That line has affected my actions too: I’ve walked back to return incorrect change. I’ve (sometimes) held back on saying bad stuff about people. I’ve dragged myself to church on Sundays… even if Saturday night was rough. I’ve thought about the ways I don’t want to sell myself — not to be a thief, or have attention or be lazy.

I doubt I’ll ever be able to give as much as my parents have. But lessons like that, on trips like that, certainly compel me to try.