happy sadness

How can so many emotions co-exist? My primary emotion is elation. Excitement that we are moving, excitement seeing our hopes and dreams come to fruition. Excitement at what the Lord is doing in our lives. Excitement at leaving my job and being able to devote that time to our home, packing, moving, and supporting my handsome hubs as he prepares for ministry and ordination.

But there's a side to all of this that I wasn't really expecting. I'm sad. Deeply sad, feeling a little grieved and a sense of loss as I face leaving this place. Granted, my work has had its ups and downs this year - a lot more downs at times than ups - but it's been four years of my life, four years of sweat, tears, and joy. Four years of ups and downs. Anyone knows that after four years of trial and error, a bond forms. Relationships have been forged in these trenches, relationships that will be with me always. I love my brothers and sisters in the faith that I've worked with here. I love this church, even with its flaws that I've had a front row seat for at times. But something about giving years of your life to a place, especially a place of ministry, does that. I've grown attached to the lives around me, the precious people and even the not-so-precious ones. It's hard to leave, much harder than I expected. My boss is one of my heroes. I've seen him and his family grow through times this year that have been so much harder than anything I've experienced or ever want to experience. And I love that family for it. There will always be a fondness in my heart for this family that I've been able to share in, just a teeny bit, while working with my boss. His adorable kids and wife that I've called for advice on more than one occasion. So many great relationships, that while our friendship will continue, I will miss that daily interaction.

However, as I mentioned at the beginning of this post, it's not just all sadness, there is a lot of happy going on right now, too. I spent most of the weekend at home cleaning out closets and going through 6 months worth of mail that needed to be filed. (YES, we paid our bills. Marz asked me that yesterday at lunch when I was telling her about it. We've been keeping up, just not filing...). Last night I attacked the pile of boxes under our guest bed that we never unpacked in the first place when we moved in. These things are giving me glimpses of what I will be able to do when I no longer have to be gone 8-10 hours out of every day, and I like what I'm seeing.

So many emotions going on... but most of all, I feel at peace. The Lord has led us, very clearly, where He wants us to go. All we have to do is trust Him.

the beginning of the end

It's done.

About 45 minutes ago I turned in my two weeks notice. I'm leaving my job on May 9.

This is starting to get very real. I'm happy, oh, so happy.

But it scares the living breath out of me. Big moves, big moments in life. Here we go!

countdown

Life doesn't have a snooze button, does it? Have I missed it? 'Cause I could really use one right now. Well, at least somewhat. See, some things I want to hurry up, other things I want to slow down. I'm so excited about moving! Transitioning into that new phase of life in Pennsylvania that waits for us. I'm excited about the ministry there, about the students and seeing God work mightily through my husband as he pours his heart into them. We get the awesome privilege of investing our time into students' lives, and that is so awesome work. It seems like we have been in the preparation stage forever. From seminary to the job search, to the actual preparation part of this ministry at the University, it feels like we have always been preparing, now we're almost to the part where we get to do what we've been in preparation for!

For the short-term, though, the exhaustion of preparation is overwhelming. Hubs is exhausted from the hours of papers and classes and exams and studying for ordination and fundraising and finishing his internship here and working and the countless other things that are taking our time. I'm exhausted from the 40 hour work schedule and fundraising and watching him be tired and trying to keep the house clean. It's a lot for us to deal with right now, and we're slowly counting down to the point where we can start checking things off of our list of things to be completed and wrapped up of our life in Texas.

I have 17 days until my last day of work. 17 days. 2 weeks from Friday, I will be walking out of the offices I've called my "day home" for 4 years and leaving behind a job that has shaped me, grown me, and seen me through many huge life changing moments. I wrote on my calendar a quote for my last day, from one of my favorite Friends episodes when Rachel has to move out of the apartment she had shared with Monica (yes, I did just compare a part of my life with a 90's sitcom), "It's the end of an era!" And yes, yes it is. A good end, a much needed end, but a sad end, nonetheless. I love my boss (and his amazing family), I love the work that he does with the 20 and 30 somethings here, and I love supporting him in that. I look forward to being able to do the same thing for hubs in Pennsylvania, but I'm going to miss that working relationship here that has worked so well. I'm going to miss some of my closest friends, Steph, Caty, Marz, Sarah, Phil, David, BZ, BK, and so many others who I've formed great bonds with in my time here. Other aspects of my job I'm not going to miss so much, but I am not going to muddy the water by throwing in the bad with all the good.

I'm looking forward to checking off a major source of stress in the form of a 40 hour per week time commitment and much emotional involvement when I leave this job to spend time preparing our home for the cross-country move, though. The time and stress relief that it will provide will be immeasurable. I look forward to being able to work at my own pace, with my own schedule. I look forward to not having to come into the office every morning, but getting up and starting work right there. Perhaps one day that will become old, but after so many years of being on a time clock in an office, the change of pace and schedule will be so refreshing!

Many changes are ahead in our future, and I've just tipped the iceburg in talking about the one so close ahead. There are many more posts coming in the future about the changes that hubs and I are experiencing in our lives during this huge transition. But for the next 2 1/2 weeks, this one will preoccupy my time most of all.

deadly projectiles

I have a poster on the wall in my office, a demotivational poster on change. It has a picture of a tornado tearing through a field and has the tag, "When the winds of change blow hard enough, the most trivial of things can become deadly projectiles."

My friend Steph gave me this poster, as it is very fitting for our life of late. Actually, I think she gave it to me right before my wedding, but it has remained an ever-constant truth throughout the year (maybe I should take it down, now that I think about it). Last night and today are another example of the deadly projectiles that I have encountered throughout the year.

This weekend was nothing if not really busy. Hubs and I spent all day Saturday meeting with people about the work which we are heading into very soon, work that up until now I have been very quiet about in my blog, but that is now at the point where we can speak freely and openly. I will get to that more later in this post. The hectic weekend led us into back to back meetings at 11:30 for brunch, 2pm, 4pm, 6pm for supper, and 8pm on Saturday until we returned to our apartment to crash about 9:30. On Sunday we had church, a lunch meeting, and then a supper meeting. It was sometime after the supper meeting that I started coming down with an infection of some sort, and was up sick all night and finally fell asleep this morning at 6:15am. I was feeling not good for most of the day, but my Dr called me in a prescription for an anitbiotic and as of about 5pm, I have been feeling much better. I can honestly track it back and chalk up getting sick to just being so tired and stressed from not having a break all week. Ick.

On a little more fun note, I came home from work on Friday evening to find hubs playing games on one of these. He found a fantastic deal on Craig's List that we just couldn't pass up.

And subsequently, I spent most of Friday night and Saturday morning playing a lot of this.

So that was the highlight of our weekend, along with the preparation for ministry that we did on Saturday and Sunday. The winds of change are blowing, and they're blowing toward the Northeast. In about 2 1/2 months we will be moving! To Pennsylvania! It's such exciting times in our lives right now. The first week in July we are packing up our little apartment that has served us so well for our first year, and trusting God for our future in campus ministry at the University in Pennsylvania. We'll be a little north of Philadelphia and a little west of New York City in a town that is small enough that I'm not going to post the name on the blog, and the name of the school will from now on just be known as the University. In preparation for this, hubs and I have been fundraising in our "spare time" for our funding (both personal and ministry). We have discovered the surprising joy of fundraising. It's amazing to see the Lord's blessing through this process. It is so humbling to watch the Lord go before us and prepare hearts of those who we have met with, and to see people grow excited about our ministry and life in Pennsylvania. This whole process has been a wide open door welcoming us into the Northeast and our new lives in ministry.

So we're excited! Big changes. I'm quitting my job in a little more than three weeks, looking forward to being able to destress a little bit and cut down on "distractions" from the process of moving and fundraising and all the details that need to happen before we move.

Prayers are appreciated, we're going to miss our friends and family here so much! But we are so excited as we walk through this process of discovering what the Lord has ahead of us.

highlights

I've been working for about a month to organize the retreat our department took this last weekend. Part of the joy of working so hard on a project is getting to see people enjoy themselves at the actual event. Everyone seemed to have a great time, and the speaker was fantastic. Hubs even managed to flip himself upside down while flying down the Zip Line 50 feet in the air, a feat that would rival some of Spider Man's best moves (I thought it was really cute).

At the end of the retreat, we showered and washed our campfire-odored jeans and drove off to Tyler where one of my dearest and best friends, Katie, got engaged (surprise, Katie!) to her wonderfully sweet boyfriend Eric. They're one of the cutest couples ever, and I don't think anything could rival their level of excitement right now. I'm so excited for them!

But perhaps the best part of the weekend, for me, was hearing from Elliott Greene, our retreat speaker extraordinaire. Elliott spoke on spiritual discernment, and most specifically for me, the concept of being malleable to the will of God. To sum up the feelings I've had lately, it's been a spiritual struggle for me to be open to instruction. At times in my life when I feel insecure, it is then that a facade of pride arises in my heart and mind. It's as if I want to be proud of myself, to feel like I know something about life when my emotions can lead me to believe that I'm stupid. And it's at those times, which ironically are the times when I need wise counsel the most, that I become unteachable in myself and resistant to the loving instruction of my peers, and even of my sweet hubs who has been placed in my life by God to lead and guide me. This is not an attitude which the Lord finds glorifying. It feels good at the conclusion of a thoughtful, reflective weekend to repent of the revealed sin in my life and search my heart that God would reveal even more to me at where I struggle.

sometimes it seems rational...

frosting on the cake

I woke up this morning feeling groggy and wiped out. I had food poisoning yesterday, spent all day on the couch playing Zoo Tycoon on my laptop and watching HGTV (in HD!). But this morning I was still feeling a little under the weather and having trouble recouping from everything that went on with my body yesterday.

Hubs had just gotten out of the shower, and was gently trying to pry me awake enough to tell him what I wanted him to put in a text message to my boss... was I going to take sick day round 2, or was I well enough to go in? I decided I was well enough to go in, but late. He sent the text, and I groggily moved my body toward the edge of the bed to sit up. My sore, aching, tired body illicited this comment from my lips, "I hate work." Hubs looked at me quizzically, tilting his head a little to the right with a smile playing at the corners of his mouth, brow furrowed slightly. "Why?"

I grimaced, groaned, and answered, "Because you have to go to it every day."

Hubs laughed and said something about me being cute, patted my head, and reminded me that I hadn't had to go to work yesterday.

But we both knew what I meant. It's just really hard sometimes to have to drag yourself out of bed when your body is tired and when you feel like being an absolute bum and get to work. To go in and sit behind a desk all day when you want to stay in your pajamas. In fact, I despise this responsibility so much sometimes that it results in words like I spoke from the shower another morning while hubs was brushing his teeth, "Adulthood sucks."

But truth be told, it doesn't. I like being an adult. Parts of responsible adulthood are really quite grand. Exibit A: hubs. I have a sweet husband that I wake up next to every morning and spend all of life's adventures and ups and downs with. A sweet man who brings me coffee and props up the pillows on these mornings so I can wake up slowly, who texts my boss from my phone so I don't even have to move my fingers until I'm awake, and who laughs at me when I make stupid comments about how much I hate going to work when I'm groggy and angry at the morning.

It's those things that help me see how much I really do like my adult life. It may not be cake most of the time, in fact, life is often as digestible as a brick being shoved down your throat. But even if I don't get to eat cake every day, hubs is definitely the frosting.

And I like the frosting better than the rest of the cake, anyway.