Intellectuelle

Name: Ashley
Birthdate: March 1980, 3 months premature
Birthplace: southern California
Current Residence: Edinburgh, Scotland
Languages: English. I'm woefully monolingual but am determined to re-learn Spanish and will try (again) to learn some French.
Ethnic heritage: mostly British, some French and German. That said, both sides of my family have been in the US since the Revolution and I had family on both sides of the Civil War.
Family stats: husband, Bryce. Met at age 17 and married at age 22. Both our families are back at home in California.
Education: Christian school K-8, Catholic prep school for high school, BA in English from Westmont College, MSc in English from Edinburgh; currently working on my PhD from Edinburgh.
Occupation: reading! I also do some research work for my supervisors and some editing for EFL students at the University; I'm TA'ing American Lit this year, too.
Hobby: reading books for fun, blogging, thinking about issues of stewardship and women's roles in the church.
Denomination: We're PCA. Bryce is licensed to preach in the PCA and is on his way to becoming ordained; in Edinburgh, we attend a Church of Scotland congregation.
Testimony: I "prayed the prayer" when I was six years old. I went through the cool-teen-Bible-with-multi-coloured-highlighting phase in junior high school. Since then my faith has become more informed, Reformed, and I hope life-changing and grace-filled.
Favorite book: Being an English person, this is hard and it changes most weeks. Favourites have been: Chaim Potok's The Chosen, Alistair Macleod's No Great Mischief, William Faulkner's Absalom! Absalom!, Moby Dick (which I'm currently reading) and anything by Flannery O'Connor, Nathaniel Hawthorne or Henry James.
Favorite author: Don't have one. See above.
Style of music: Most things mellow like Coldplay, Iron & Wine, big band stuff, old jazz and Alison Kraus. But then I like U2 and 80s music too.
Favorite musicians: Derek Webb, Sandra McCracken, U2. I'm a big fan of Jars of Clay's "Redemption Songs".
Favorite visual artist(s): Van Gogh, especially his "Olive Trees", Vermeer, Turner, Makoto Fujimura.
Last Good Book Read: Moby Dick (well, I'm only half-way through reading it).
Last Good Movie Seen: Don't watch all that many movies. Probably "Finding Neverland".
Favorite movie: the BBC 6-hour version of "Pride and Prejudice".
Childhood Memory: running away from my own birthday party because I was overwhelmed with all the kids.
First Car: 1991 Jeep Cherokee
Inspiration: women who seem to do it all, Christians who live intentional lives.
Personality type: INFJ (strong on the J and I)
Pet Peeve: bad grammar (especially incorrect use of apostrophes, it's and its), people who can't make interesting conversation (although I, of course, do fall into this category far too often) and poor manners.
Cuisine: Whatever I feel like cooking -- Indian, Greek, Thai, Italian etc.
Favorite color(s): blue and red
Favorite flowers: anything that's freshly put in a vase; I love our red geraniums we have in our window boxes. Bryce always bought me white roses when we were dating; I still get the occasional bouquet (even on a student budget).
Favorite time of day: mid-morning when I'm cognisant and can enjoy the day. Or in Scotland, whenever it's not horribly windy and/or raining.
Favorite season: spring in Scotland (the greens here are amazing), summer at home.
Favorite place to be: home, with family, or by myself.
Unhealthy obsession: over-analysing friendships, myself or my husband rather than enjoying people in the moment.
Weaknesses: pride, feeling anxious as to the future, not being a good listener, butting into conversations and being easily forgetful (these are just a sampling).
Aversions: cigarette smoke, and currently (oddly), meat.
Long term goals and/or dreams: To glorify God and enjoy Him forever; to always love learning, reading and writing; to not become consumed by any future roles I may have (as a professor, wife, mother, etc); to solidly fix my identity in Christ alone. I'd love to go to Russia, get back into creative writing, have my own organic garden and learn another language well.