Late Night Ramblings

I just sat here and listened to Alice cry herself to sleep for 35 minutes.  It was a very long 35 minutes, and I started to get the itch to write something profound; this is not it.  This is just a post where I write down anything that comes to mind.

So much is changing right now.  I am getting ready to go back to school the first time as a mom; I don't know how I am going to handle being away from Alice, and I don't know how Alice is going to handle being away from me.  I hope that I love the time I spend at work just as much as I always have, and I make the most of my time at home with my family.  I worry, not about Alice, but about Lisa, Alice's babysitter.  I'm not worried that she won't know what to do--she is a wonderful mom and I trust her fully--I worry that Alice will scream her head off and Lisa will decide after one week that it just isn't worth it.

My best friend is moving this week.  I don't really know what I will do once she's gone.  I call her all the time for parenting advice, and I don't know how many times she has fed Joe and me. Even though I didn't ever act on it, I knew I could drop by anytime I wanted (as long as it was after 10:00 AM) and just sit and chat.  I didn't have to be anything special.  I could say what I wanted, as long as it wasn't about sex and I didn't swear.  I tried.  I don't think I've ever had a friend where I felt comfortable enough to just drop by and hang out.  I will miss her so much.  And it's not just Kristin that's moving.  Practically everyone that I have felt comfortable in my ward is moving.  There are only a couple ladies in my ward now that I feel comfortable around.  It will just be so weird around here without the same faces that have been here for the last 4 or so years.

I will begin my sixth year of teaching this fall.  It's crazy to me that I am still there; I am totally blown away that my seventh graders that I student taught graduated last year.  I couldn't believe it.  And I have another student teacher this fall.  I still feel like I have no idea what I am doing, and they still trust me to train another teacher.  It's like the blind leading the blind.  Heaven help the next generation of children.

I feel like that everything in my life is different now--even the security I have always felt is shaky.  We never know how much money Joe will make from week to week, and it scares me.  I don't ever know if we will have enough to pay our bills, and a couple of times when it looked like we wouldn't make it, something wonderful would come along, like a side-job from my sister, which saved our tails, or a couple of extra bucks from Joe's grandma for mowing the lawn.  And then I watch the news, and things get even scarier.  I don't feel like I recognize the country I grew up in, and really the only thing I have to cling to is the church.

The other night, Joe was looking for jobs online.  He found a job in Virginia that both of us felt he would get if he applied.  We are fairly positive.   But we haven't applied for it.  I was talking to Joe about it, and he said, "Everything would be so different.  It's scary going somewhere where nothing will be like you are used to."  The only think I could think of was that everything would be different, except the church.  It occurred to me, that if we took that chance, that there would be a ward there that ran similar to our ward now.  We would learn the same things in Relief Society and Sunday School in Virginia that we would learn in Utah.  That was the only thing that made me say, if you want that job, let's do it.  

Now, as I type this, I am reminded that the only thing that I know is stable right now, and the only thing that is keeping me grounded is the knowledge that no matter how many times people I know move, or how many new things are happening in my life, the church is always there, steadfast and unmovable.  Something to hold on to, kind of like a portkey in the Harry Potter books: I can put my finger on it, and no matter where I go or what swirls around me, I am there, anchored to that one thing I have my finger on.  Unchangeable, unshakable.  I cling to the promises of tithing.  It's the only thing I have in my back pocket when Joe gets nervous about money.  Do we pay our tithing?  Yes.  Then we will be taken care of.  Alice will have food in her belly and clothes on her back; it's a fact, and nothing can change those.  That is one thing I know and one thing that I wrap my arms around and won't let go.  

I sit here and look around my house and realize how messy it is, and how unorganized I am.  And I realize that it doesn't matter.  I will clean the house eventually.  I will do the dishes sometime tomorrow.  But tonight, I need to be with my husband.  I need to go check on Alice and see if she has somehow squirmed and turned herself practically sideways so her face can be right next to the night-light again (see above picture).  I need to lay in bed and think about all the things that are so steady and rock-solid that I can plant my feet on as everything else around me moves so fast I can't see what I've missed.