An Unwieldy Character

 I've been wanting to write for several days, and I have given myself the goal of writing at least one blog post a month in 2025, so tonight I sat down with my laptop and opened my blog dashboard.

But then, instead of writing, I read. I read post after post, so many things and moments and feelings I had forgotten. I cried. I cried as I reread about Grandmother's ICU stay and posts about my kids who are now moved out and gone on to make their own lives. I reflected. I reflected on lessons that the Lord has shown me through Scripture and through his lessons and through experiences. I read a post in which I talked about the 11 years of my profession I have left in front of me and that post feels like I wrote it yesterday. However, that post was 5 years ago and I have 6 years left now. 

Time is just such an unwieldy character.

I find it simultaneously shocking and not the slightest bit surprising that the amount of years to my retirement is so small. Francisco graduated from CHS 6 years ago. That event feels like a minute and a lifetime ago. I know that 2031 will feel the same way.

If things continue as they are (and we all know that is never a guarantee), the time I have left can be broken down in this way:

6 more yearbooks

6 more rounds of Holocaust Lit

6 AP classes

1 RISE group and a portion of another

6 graduations

That is mind-boggling to me. 6 is so close to single hand digits. 

I want to find ways to make the next 6 years my best yet. I don't want to grow old and bitter and hopeless and cynical. I want to end this thing on a peak, with a bang instead of a whimper. I want my final 6 years to be the ones I remember with such joy and contentment. I'm not sure what to do in order to make that happen, but that's what I'm searching for.

It’s Not My Most Exciting Word of the Year

 align

verb [ T ]

UK  

 /əˈlaɪn/ US  

to change something so that it has a correct relationship to something else

My 2025 word didn’t come to me very quickly. I had a short list of words and really was feeling more drawn to a different word (Selah). However, as I completed my 2024 reflection, I realized that (maybe inadvertently and definitely to my detriment at the time), I had really practiced Selah (a pause) in that year. However, I wasn’t pausing to reflect or to praise or to correct, I was just… paused. And I felt like it was time to fix the things that were stagnant in 2024. So another word on my short list, Align, kept coming to my spirit. 

I cannot help but feel that align is going to be… uncomfortable in the making. When your back is out of alignment it can be very painful to correct it. However, it’s also an uncomfortable and painful position to be in, so even if the practice of it brings discomfort, the relief afterward will be joyful. When your tires are out of alignment, your car drives poorly, but as soon as they fix it, the car drives perfectly again. So I guess I’m committing myself to a year of potential discomfort for the purpose of a lifetime of improved living.

I hope. That’s the idea, anyway.

I need to take this year to get things in order, to “change some things so they have a correct relationship with some other things”. And I feel like I have the tools at hand to work through that, and finally the desire, the motivation, and the understanding of the need to do so. I have a sense that this year is going to be a highly structured year, and that’s what I’ll need to hold myself to the discipline required to get better. I gave myself a lot of grace this past year, allowed myself to be held, but now it’s time to stand up and move. 

We worked a lot of puzzles this past week in West Virginia. Well, they worked a lot, I stepped in here and there to get frustrated and walk away. When I first sat down to the giant one in my picture, it was complete chaos with only part of the outer rim done. I looked around what they had done and noticed that in several places, someone had joined two pieces. Just two, not connected to the whole. I said to Kelsey that I appreciated whomever had done that because they weren’t being overwhelmed by 1000 pieces that all looked the same and were laying all over the table, they just worked till they found two that connected and started there. Then two more. Then a string of three. And eventually, those would become part of a larger picture that was forming. Over the next few days, it slowly started to come together. When we left, it was almost all done except one of the bowls. But it took the alignment of two in the beginning to get to the finished work. 

A writer I follow, Jon Acuff, has a saying from one of his books (Soundtracks, and I HIGHLY recommend it) that says, “Perfect is the enemy of done.” I get paralyzed sometimes by the enemies of done. I think if I can’t do something all the way, and immediately, I won’t do it at all. But sometimes just putting the two puzzle pieces in place… committing to improving my water intake by one full mug every day… is the impetus it takes to end up with the full puzzle completed. 

I’ll not say that I’m eager about the year ahead. It’s not very sexy, not very shiny, not very exciting, this alignment that is to come. I much prefer words from my short list like Selah and Faithful or words I keep waiting to find me like Adventure and Thrive and Bloom. However, I know that in the work there might be discomfort but in the product there is joy. So I’m committed to putting in the work.

Selah. 😜

Held.

 Held.

My 2024 word was “held”, and it was one of those years where I saw the purpose behind my word over and over and over.

The year… wasn’t awful. It wasn’t great, but it wasn’t awful. 

I rang in 2024 in a hospital room in Chattanooga, sleeping in a recliner by my mom’s bed while my sister stayed home with my dad, who was also sick. And caregiving and medical things became the theme of the year. My dad had a lifechanging and lifesaving surgery (LVAD) at the end of February, and then ended up remaining in the hospital for a while, plus going back two more times after he was discharged. My mom and my sister lived in Nashville during that period and I went when I could. While my dad was there, my Grandaddy’s health was fading quickly. I tried to spend time with him when I could as well, and he did rebound for a time until he passed away at the end of the summer. Dad ended up turning a major corner and is just doing so well, his strength has come back in ways we never expected. Mom has had her health struggles this year as well, as has Kraig’s mom, some we are still working through. It’s a really strange new world, this world of aging parents, and it’s all new territory.

This was our first full year as empty nesters, and some days it’s awesome and some days it’s so sad. I do always miss my kids but I also absolutely love when they come home, plus getting to see them in their own places is so much fun. 

Angela graduated from NAPS in May and Kraig and I were able to go and see her ceremony and then fly home with her, saying goodbye to Rhode Island and trading it for Annapolis in June. Emma, Kelsey, and Nolan drove up with me to take her for I-Day and we had a good time together. It definitely made leaving her less painful for me. She survived plebe summer and then Kraig and I got to go back to see her for parents’ weekend at the end and that was a wonderful time too. We even snuck in another trip up in October for Kraig to run the Marine Corps Marathon in Washington, D.C., and his parents joined us. That was a great weekend too, since we got to see a rugby game! Angela had been home for Thanksgiving and Christmas and we have loved having her. Kelsey wrapped up freshman year at the dorm at Tech and was home for the summer, then we moved her into a cute little townhouse with 3 of her friends. She has had a great semester and is starting to get into her elementary education courses. She’s also over recruitment for her sorority and she’s big into that. Roman is halfway through his junior year at Lee and has enjoyed his observation hours and also working with kids in the aftercare. Francisco still lives across the field and works for two landscaping companies. Emma has had probably the biggest year (except maybe Angela), heading toward her college graduation with a double major in business management and HR and getting engaged in October. We are deep into the wedding planning for her and Nolan’s June wedding. 

Kraig has spent the year training. For what? Anything. He trained for a half Ironman all spring and summer, only to have it canceled due to a hurricane (the same hurricane that wreaked havoc on parts of NE TN and Virginia and NC, a historic storm). He had already done the Fall Creek Falls one. He pivoted and did the Marine Corps marathon in October and now is signed up for multiple triathlons and is planning some more marathons too. Francisco ran with him this week in WV and I think they’re planning to do some half’s this spring.

My professional year has been such a mixed bag. As far as school and teaching, the first half of 2024 was a delight and the second half was… not. 😂 I’ve struggled a lot this past semester with time management, connection, and motivation. I don’t know what’s going on but I have not enjoyed it. I’ve got some tough classes and some hard situations and I’ve let myself get in my own mind about some things and it’s made it challenging. I’m hoping that everything changes for the better next semester. We did finish one yearbook, the best one yet with the best staff and most amazing editors, then start this one (also the best one yet, also with the best staff, and also with the most amazing editors!). 

As for my travel business… wow. What a year. My goal for 2023 was to do 25% better than I did in 2022, and I don’t remember what I ended up doing it I more than met that goal. My goal for 2024 was to do 25% better than I did in 2023, and I did 62% better! I learned so much this year and really enjoyed the work. I have the best clients and hearing their happy memories of their trips when they get back is my favorite thing. I have six more years before retirement from teaching, and I hope to have travel established as a primary income by that time. More years like 2024 and I’ll be well on my way. I did have to work very hard and put a lot of time, energy, and effort into it, however. It did not happen organically. One of my specific goals was to use the phone more than email, and I definitely accomplished that. I’m pretty proud of my business year. (Which is a good thing because I would feel like a pretty big failure professionally if all I had to go on was my teaching job this year.)

I didn’t have a great year at all in regard to health and wellness, physical or mental/emotional. I honestly think I spent a lot of this year in a state of depression, which is a change from my usual anxiety, and the absolute lack of energy and motivation was tough. I didn’t walk, I didn’t hold very well to my fasting, I wasn’t committed to any kind of spiritual disciplines, and I turned to sugars for comfort. I have a lot of work to do to turn all of this around next year, but I’m going to do it.

We did a ton of traveling this year… a spring break cruise with most of my kids, visiting Angela in RI and Annapolis, Vegas, a family cruise in the summer and then a cruise for me and Kraig over fall break, Bear Paw, a travel conference in Fort Lauderdale, Key West (Dry Tortugas). We discovered the joy of weekend trips, Kraig and I did, and it’s definitely something we want to continue, I did get to check off two more national parks in Dry Tortugas and St John, USVI. Travel fills my cup and it was a great year for it.

Even in the midst of the challenging, the frustrating, the sad, the muck, and the mess ups, even when I wasn’t spending the time with Him that He deserved and desired, I can honestly say I felt “held” by the Lord this year. If I had not, I don’t know that I would be able to label this year as “not awful”. I also felt held by the ones in my life who love me. No matter what is happening in their own worlds, my parents always manage to make us feel treasured. Even in the loss of Grandaddy, it was another reminder of the ways our extended family carries in and holds each other. Even with my kids scattered across the United States (at least the eastern side), they were so good to keep us informed and involved. Kraig is the only guy I know who can commit so fully to the things he commits to and also make me feel so held. My friends, my book club, my lunch group, my students, my yearbook staff, my social media friends, my coworkers, my admin, my clients… so many people who made such a difference every single day in my life. Perhaps the most unexpected and sweetest relationships from this year have been with my hexmates, two of whom are new (either to our hex or our school). 

As a strange contrast to, or maybe it’s just a further exploration of, my 2024 word, I think my biggest area of growth this year has been learning to let some things go. I guess I have started to figure out what deserves to be held and what needs to be released. I still have a very long way to go in this area, but every time I say, “It doesn’t matter to me, whatever you want to do” about something that would have driven me crazy the year before, I have a little party in my brain. 

As I move forward into a new year, I’m feeling very settled. That’s a purposeful word choice. Often we say we are excited about the coming year. I think 2024 battered me enough that excited isn’t the word I would use, but I am settled. I’m ready. I have a plan. I’ve held on through the mountaintops and the valleys and I’m here for a new year. 

Grace

 Last year, I found myself saying to someone that, “I’ve never had two seniors graduating at the same time, one going through the process for a service academy appointment, while I was also a teacher of seniors while working a side job(s) and producing a yearbook and parenting other kids and being a wife.”

I was saying that to explain some balls I had dropped, and some plates that had stopped spinning. Was it presented as an excuse? I guess it kind of was, and could be taken as such, but it made me step back and think to myself how true it was. I had done several of those things before, and I had already parented three seniors through to graduation, but none of the times before compared to doubling everything AND helping Angela with all the service academy hoops. 

And it wasn’t that I messed up on purpose, or even that I took on too much, it was merely that I didn’t KNOW what would prove to be too much because it was my first time. 

I’ve actually thought about it a lot since. We had never collectively lived through a pandemic before. I know people dealing with chronic or terminal diagnoses who have never lived with something like that before. Some people in my circle have never suffered tremendous losses and grieved loved ones before. And it’s not all bad things, either. 

The good, the great, can still be complicated when you’re a novice at them. Some people have never worked this fabulous new job before. Some have never had a spouse to factor into everything before. First time parents have never adjusted to a baby’s schedule before. Second time parents have never had to figure out how to shower while a toddler and an infant are looked after. 

Think for a second about how many things in our lives, just today or this week or month or year, we are doing for the first time. All of us.

And maybe, just maybe, we could all be a little more understanding of and patient with each other. 

Several years ago, I saw a quote that said, “May grace be my first response.”

I often get around to grace, but I’m ashamed to say that it is seldom my first response. I told my students all of first semester, this schedule is brand new to me too. I’ll give you grace but I need it in return. And we did, all of us, because we made it a point to ask for it, to be aware of the intentionality of grace.

So maybe as we go through this life, it would do us good to remember all the things that people are doing for the very first time, and grace can be our first response instead of the one we get to after damage has already been done.

Practicing the Art of Abiding

 I usually write this blog post on New Year’s Eve, before the family comes over to Sandy’s for pizza and games and the turning of the clock. This year I did a lot of reflecting in the days prior to December 31, and I considered writing the blog post then, but I decided to wait.

Never has there been a more clear illustration of my 2023 word than the one I am experiencing in this moment. 

I’m writing this blog on my phone from a chair beside my mom’s hospital bed. It’s the first New Year’s Eve I haven’t spent with Kraig since we got engaged, the first I’ve ever been away from my kiddos. Yesterday, when I received word that she had been admitted (originally due to Flu A and a super low pulse ox but now kept for heart issues), I grabbed my stuff, kissed my family goodbye, and left WV for Tennessee so that my sister could leave the hospital and sit with my dad, who also has the flu at home. We thought she was going to be going home today, then the heart stuff ramped up, so we spent the day waiting on cardiology consults and a plan. If you’ve ever spent time in a hospital at the mercy of everyone else, you know how that went. Even now, no one has explicitly said we are here for the night but it’s 9:09 and that seems assumed. 

… to remain, to stay… … to wait for, to await…

In truth, I wasn’t super pumped about this word. I worried that there was going to be a tortuous event or situation that I was going to have to tolerate, to pay the price of. But I always feel very strongly that my words of the year come from the Lord and so if I was going to need to be reminded of the ability to stay, I was going to be relieved that He was beside me.

I ended up seeing glimmers of what my word meant. It wasn’t a word that I was constantly reminded of, like 2022’s Shivelight. But instead it was a word I regularly reminded myself of.

As our entire family life changed, I had to abide in our new normal. I had to be left behind and abide in missing my kiddos but also watching them develop new lives in their new places. And MAN was that fun!

Regarding my health, I had to both abide and also push. I am so grateful for that day in September when I had a scary heart moment at school and had two people tell me what I needed to say to my doctor in order to get results. I’m thankful I saw a different doctor that next week, a PA who listened to me and immediately took action, setting all factors in place for a specialist to schedule a Halloween pacemaker. My life has been changed for the better and I am forever thankful for that.

Abide for me this year was a reminder of the ways He is beside us in all of the moments— big and little, high and low. He’s here in the crazy busy and when life comes to a grinding halt. He’s here when we are surrounded by people and when we are alone in a big empty house. He’s here to help when I take on too much and He’s here when I’m working to hold it all together.

Abide. 2023 was a year of abiding.

And honestly, when I look back on 2023, MAN was it an incredible year. I did have to grow a lot and learn a lot, but the high points were SO HIGH.

I told my mom, if all I did in 2023 was take our big family trip to Alaska (best trip of my life to date) and get a pacemaker, it would be a winner of a year. I repeated that to a friend, and told her that then you add in all of the AMAZING moments and accomplishments of my graduating seniors, watching Emma and Roman solidify their paths and achieve, seeing Francisco start to rebuild some roads and bridges, take more INCREDIBLE trips like our Empty Nest Fall Break trip to Europe, see my travel business meet and exceed the goals I set for myself a year ago, and take the UTTER JOY I am receiving from yearbook and… dadGUM 2023– you killed it. My friend then added, “And skydiving and getting to finally take kids to Model UN again” and YES! That too! 

I have some work to do in 2024, some things I let slip in 2023 (mainly the second half of the year, and I think because I just kind of STOPPED in order to sort of reward myself for the utter insanity of things that I managed to pull of during the first half of the year), but I’m up for it. 

My fears of this year’s word meaning it was going to be a year I had to tolerate didn’t pan out at all. The synonyms of abide are tarry, live, persevere, endure, bear, and support. In 2023, I LIVED. I persevered with Him supporting me every step. I’m headed into 2024 stronger from the abiding I did in 2023. And filled with joy at all that filled me in this previous year.

The picture with this blog post is not the best picture of me ever taken… even the best taken this year… or even the best taken on that particular trip. But it’s a picture that was taken without me knowing it was being taken, and I have never seen a candid photo of me that captures my sheer joy in a moment like that one does. We were on the whale watching boat and I was absolutely filled with delight with everything in my life at that time. It was utter, raw, pure, unadulterated JOY. That’s the abiding that 2023 gave me.

"Moses My Servant is Dead."

 My pastor preached today out of Joshua. It was a powerful sermon, focused on the command that the Lord gives Joshua (and Joseph, and Peter, and Job and many others) to "ARISE!"

But I'm going to be honest, I struggled to get past the first words of Joshua 1:

"After the death of Moses, the servant of the Lord, the Lord said to Joshua son of Nun, Moses' aide: "Moses my servant is dead. Now then, you and all these people, get ready to cross the Jordan River into the land I am about to give to them-- to the Israelites."

In my personal devotional time, I'm doing a study on the book of Exodus. So I'm all tied up with Moses in my heart. I relate so much to Moses in the beginning of his call, when he proclaims his fear of speaking and begs God to find someone else. I think Moses was probably someone who struggled a little with anxiety and a lack of self-confidence, so it means all the more to me that the Lord used him to do these incredible things I am reading about every day. Yesterday my reading was about the Passover, and the absolutely human and very unholy thought I had as I read was, "Oh my gosh, these directions are SO SPECIFIC! I would never have been able to remember what to tell the people to do, and heaven knows people in today's time would never have listened and followed the directions!"

But as I see Moses do allllllll of these things, or more specifically see God do alllllllll of these things through Moses, I am a perfect illustration of dramatic irony because I know the ending, the things that Moses and his people did not know when they were living it. I know that Moses, as much as he trusted God and accomplished for him, did not get to see the Promised Land. He died in the desert.

He died in the desert. There wasn't a homecoming for him, a congratulatory party, a book signing, an awards ceremony... just a discouraging death in a dry place, not having seen the end of the story. His story ended in the desert. 

Joshua's story started with the entry into the Promised Land, but as my pastor preached today, it wasn't all "promise". A lot of it was "problem", like having people who angered God and having to circumcise grown men. And honestly, that beginning isn't exactly auspicious. "Moses, my servant, is dead. Now then you..." Not, "Hey, Joshua! You are the guy! I've been so excited for you to lead these people because I knew you were the best man for the job." Nope, more "Moses was my number one man, and he messed up, so now it's on you. And you're not exactly a number one, you're more of a number two. But even number one couldn't do it without messing up, so... good luck, number two." (I know that's not what He was saying, but Joshua was a human and I'm sure it sounded a little like that to him.)

I think sometimes I get really wrapped up on what seems "fair". I am a big fan of closure. I like neat and tidy beginnings and endings. If Moses started the journey, then it seems only right that Moses get to finish it, not this second-string Joshua guy. (And listen, I actually love Joshua and his story is one of my favorites. But for right now, I'm thinking of Moses.)

But what I often forget is that the journey, the story, goes far beyond one career or one lifetime or one generation, even. The story stretches the entire scope of humanity. And while it may seem only fair to me that I get to see the fruition of the labors I engage in, I might not. And I also might mess up and someone else may have to take the mantle from me. 

I don't think Moses died feeling slighted. The Lord showed him all that would belong to Israel, and the Bible says his eyes nor his strength were weak. It goes on to say that no one else has done what Moses did in the eyes of the Lord. The will of the Lord stretches far beyond one man or one lifetime. Moses had a part to play, a huge part, and he played it so well. Then Joshua's part started. And on it went, person after person. And it continues today with me and with you.

Abide.

 I guess since I wrote my December 31 post on January 15, I might as well also write my January 1 post on January 15. :)

abide: verb

1. to wait;

2. to pause;

3. to watch;

4. to stay;

5. to continue in a place;

6. to continue without fading or being lost;

7. to remain stable or fixed in some state or condition;

8. to be left;

9. to stand up under;

10. to await submissively

I think it was late October, maybe November, when I felt the Lord give me my 2023 word. And here's the truth: I did not want this one.

I was hoping for "adventure", or "bloom", or "flourish". I'm waiting for "sunshine" and "fun", but so far I haven't gotten those. :) I like to GO, I don't want to ABIDE. I want to DO, not ABIDE. Abide is BORING.

Or maybe "abide" is terrifying. When I started to know very clearly that my word was "abide", the fear started to set it. What if my word is "abide" because I'm going to get a terminal diagnosis this year and He wants me to learn to rest in it? What if it's "abide" because some tragedy is going to befall my family and He wants to teach me to trust? What if any number of awful things???

And then the reason I need this word was made perfectly clear: Worry and anxiety are direct results of an inability to abide. As long as I am abiding in Him, I am trusting His hand and His path. It's when I stop abiding and start trying to handle it myself that the anxiety and fear set in. 

I also just wrote in my 2022 reflection that I did not do a good job in a daily commitment to His disciplines this past year, and I want to do better this year. I want to abide in His word and His voice. My pastor said on the first Sunday of the new year that we are terrible at waiting on the Lord in silence, we try to fill the space with talking, and that's surely me. To learn to abide means to learn to wait, to listen.

In addition, I'm a mom who is going to wake up to a relatively empty house in a few short months. Emma will get a place with a 12 month lease, so the home visits will change and become less frequent. The last two will graduate and go away to college. The middle, while back in the house this semester living at home while going to Lee, may decide to move back on campus or somewhere else. After living in a household of 7 people as recently as March of 2020, the whole "to be left" part is pretty obvious. And within that, the "continue to be without fading or being lost" seems very relevant too because I will be the first to say that a lot of my identity is tied up in momming the kids in my house.

My goals for this year are the same as every year for about the past 4... I just want to continue to refine the habits I have already started. And in it, I want to learn to abide.

"He who dwells in the shelter of the Most High will abide in the shadow of the Almighty. I will say to the Lord, 'My refuge and my fortress, my God, in whom I trust." ~Psalms 91:1-2

"You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you that you should go and bear fruit and that your fruit should abide, so that whatever you ask the Father in my name, he may give it to you." ~John 15:16