Tolkien Reading Day + Hobbit Inspired Outfits

Did you know March 25 is Tolkien Reading Day? It’s coming up!

On a lighter note, I’ve got three Shire-inspired outfit ideas if you want to dress like a modern Frodo Baggins! It doesn’t have to be Tolkien Reading Day to get your hobbit-style on!

On a more meaningful note, I want to share what marriage, depression, and Tolkien have in common.

Eight years ago, right after I got married, I was depressed and reading Lord of the Rings for the first time ever.  I was in a very low place because I was on birth control and it hurt me more than helped me. It gave me hormonal moods that kept me in very low and dark places I couldn’t get out of. Plus, I had a lot of expectations about marriage that weren’t coming true and I thought everything that was wrong with my marriage was my fault. PLUS PLUS, I didn’t have a job and felt purposeless. 

Birth contorl made me feel like a raging monster who was only ever angry or depressed. And nothing else. I felt more like the bad guy most days than the good guy. The first few months we were married I was applying to jobs and we didn’t have internet at our home, so anytime I wasn’t at the coffee shop submitting resumes (which is a draining and discouraging process in and of itself), I was at home having a pity party. 

I had been carrying around The Lord of the Rings trilogy all throughout collge, never having touched it. But if you’ve ever graduated from college and found yourself with lots of free time, you know it all of a sudden feels nice to pick up a book and read it. No one told you to. You didn’t get a grade for it. You just decided to read for fun. It was the only thing I felt I could do. I committed to read the first book through, even if I hated it. 

So I did. I read the first book, then the second… I read the entire trilogy back to back in my lowest of months. 

And it was Sam’s loyalty to Frodo that made me feel the story so deeply for the first time. You don’t see the intense loyalty as much in the movies. I’d never heard any woman call them bosom friends, but that’s what they were. They were right up there with Anne and Diana. 

In so many ways, I felt like Frodo at my lowest, feeling as if I couldn’t go on, wishing for happier days, wondering if I’d ever have them again…. And in a lot of ways, I felt like Brett was my Sam, encouraging me in the best ways he knew how, loyal to carry my burdens on our journey. Frodo needed Sam. And in that dark season, I needed Brett. 

When I found out it was Tolkien Reading Day, all I could think of was my gratitude for Tolkien writing this story. Gratitude for characters who helped me see hope and light even when I was in a season of barely being able to get out of bed. I feel gratitude for characters whose friendships stood the test of time and hardship. I feel gratitude for every weird and LONGGGG paragraph detailing the shire. I feel gratitude that in real life, I have experienced these friendships that run deep from my heart to my soul.