Marcy Hannula
Core I
July 16, 2013
Loving & Learning
In a small farming town in eastern North Carolina, I was born Marcy Ann Marshburn, to my parents, Byron and Sharon, on a scorching late-August day in 1980. Growing up, the smell of sweet tobacco rising from the tin-roofed barns in the summer meant warm meals on our winter table. My lullabies were sung by a chorus of crickets and locusts, while lightning bugs danced in the shadows of tall pine trees behind my house; it was built by my grandfather, with yellow trim that hung like a frame around red brick. When I was nine years old, my family was expanded by one when my sister, K.C., arrived. Unlike me, shy and unsure with fair skin, dark hair, and hazel eyes like my father, she was a blonde, curly-haired, blue-eyed ball of energy. She was captivating from the very beginning, and the center of all of our attention. We were almost a decade apart, so many times, we have had a relationship that was more like a mother bear protecting her baby cub, rather than typical bickering sisters.
While I may not live on a farm anymore, I am still up before the sun to work at my job as a teacher in Apex, North Carolina. After moving to Raleigh in 1998 to attend North Carolina State University, the area began to feel like a new home, and I decided to stay. It is a good thing I did! I met my best friend and husband, Chris, in 2009, and we were married in the fresh, autumn air of the North Carolina mountains one year later. Since then, we’ve made a home in Holly Springs with our two dogs, Marley and Clark W. Griswold. Marley, my deaf, blind Lhasa Apso, has been with me since I was nineteen, and I can’t imagine life without her. Clarky, on the other hand, my speckled, spunky jackahuahua, is a new addition to our family.
When work gets hectic, my main escape is my family, but I also love to read; whether it’s catching up on the latest teen reads or reading the plant-strong recipes I love to create from cooking magazines, it’s one of my favorite ways to relax and find a place of my own. Additionally, running and leaving the worries of the day on the pavement under my feet while blasting some of my favorite music by The Postal Service or Led Zeppelin, is pure heaven. If I’m not getting exercise on my own, then America’s favorite pastime, baseball, is another way I like to unwind. There’s something about the crack of a wooden bat, the clouds of smoke billowing from the bustling concession stands, and the dust rising from the field after a third-base slide that makes me feel like a kid again. For further escape, I enjoy floating light as a cloud over the waters of a secluded mountain lake or in the salty waters of the intercoastal waterway in my kayak. Life just seems to creep by and slow down for me as I paddle my way along the winding turns.
Clearly, reading and the outdoors keep me wonderfully happy here at home, but traveling has rewarded me with some of the most incredible memories imaginable. On our trips to Massachusetts, my husband and I walk through the cobbled streets of Boston, explore the tiny shops of Faneuil Hall, and sing “Sweet Caroline” at the bottom of the 8th at Fenway Park. Just recently, we returned from France, which to me is the most stunning place on earth! The architecture, history, people and landscapes of this beautiful country captivate my attention like nothing else, and I still have vivid dreams of our adventures there. In the future, one of my most important goals is to be fluent in the language that’s music to my ears, French, and to learn another type of music, by mastering the ukulele. From reading and exploring new places to learning new things, what I value most in my life is love and learning, and I hope to continue to do both for many years to come!