resigned, redux

Two years ago, I wrote a post that solidified my name choice for this blog.

I was full of heartache over loss- the loss of my home, my friends, my job... most of my life.

Two years ago, I wrote that I would move back from Louisiana in two years. #didn'thappen

A year and a half ago, I chose deliberate as my word of the year. Then, as I was working on my 2018 word of the year, I had this realization. Followed by this one.

At the beginning of June, all of my summer plans changed.

At the end of July, I resigned.

This, however, was a happy resignation. It was me following through with confidence on something that I knew I needed to do, but was too afraid of uncertainty to follow through with.

I resigned my teaching position. The one I took on a whim. The one that made me miserable for the better part of last year.

I don't know what I'm going to do now, and that's okay. I believe in myself. I am learning to trust myself again. It's a beautiful and scary process filled with a lot of tears, but I am so relieved to be back on track. I am paving my own happiness.

if it's meant to be, part 1

Last fall, I accepted an offer to serve as an adult adviser on a Philmont trek with a Venture Crew from Shreveport.



For those unfamiliar, Philmont is basically the mecca of Boy Scouting. It's their high adventure base in the mountains of New Mexico where you go to backpack/hike 60+ miles and participate in high adventure activities over the course of 10 days. It's expensive and requires many months of planning and training, but it's something I've always wanted to do. And, since I am within driving distance (12-ish hours) here in Louisiana, and because I'm not getting any younger, I jumped at the opportunity to go.

insert months of researching and buying gear for the trek, hundreds of dollars saved and paid, and many miles of practice hiking with a 30lb pack completed

Two weeks before our crew was slated to leave Shreveport on Friday, June 15, a wildfire was reported in the vicinity of Philmont. The Ute Park Fire proceeded to grow and burn through the center of the 140,000+ acre property. For days, I scoured the internet for updates, watched as staff was evacuated, and checked for reports on damage to buildings. I knew our trek was in jeopardy, but when staff were allowed to return to the campus, I was cautiously optimistic.

The official announcement came just 10 days before I was supposed to leave: all backcountry treks scheduled from June 8 through July 14 (and later, the entire season) were cancelled.

This was difficult information to process. I knew it was most likely going to happen, but when it did I wasn't mentally or emotionally prepared. For over a day I alternated between non-stop texting everyone who would listen to me grieve (selected Boy Scout friends who "got" what a huge disappointment this was) and walking around in a confused stupor, trying to figure out what to do with my summer which had been so meticulously planned for over half a year.

I didn't have long to figure it out, however, because my first jaunt of the summer was slated to begin with a 14 hour eastward drive on June 7.

(to be continued)

homeless

I'm rolling into the two year anniversary of moving to Louisiana, and for the most part I have resigned myself to the fact that I live there now. My husband is not looking for other employment opportunities, and 2/3 of my children prefer to continue their educations there. I have friends, and I have a job (if I wish to continue it).

I live there, but it's not my home.

I've probably traveled back to North Carolina about a dozen times since I moved away, and upon my 2nd or 3rd trip back, I realized something that is solidifying with each additional visit:

This is not my home, either.

I don't feel like I belong in either place.

That's a disconcerting feeling- discovering that you don't feel at home in either of the places where you've lived for the past 30+ years.

So if I don't belong here or there, where do I belong?

I am not without a home, but I feel homeless.

Marching forth

(because today is March 4th. See what I did there?)

January began with a blissful week of extended vacation, followed by a shortened week for MLK holiday, and 2 snow days the following week. It was very stressful because I was responsible for all the lesson planning, but I enjoyed the topic (space science) and managed to not disappoint my colleagues. I'll call that a win.

February flew by in an equally fleeting manner and now it is March.

I must admit, I am struggling with my word, confidence. I usually project an outward air of confidence (bordering on arrogance, sometimes), but inside I am a bowl of mush. A doubting, self-deprecating, questioning, helpless-feeling ball of mush who can't make decisions and is thoroughly confused.

• I did not make the bold decision to say I am not returning to my job next year when asked a few weeks ago, even though I hate about 78% of my job.
• I constantly question my choices.
• I do not trust myself.
• I do not know how to change.

I haven't been crafting much. I splurged and bought myself a set of metal stamping letters and associated tools for the primary purpose of creating something that says "confidence," but I need to follow through with that project. I'm afraid of messing up my stamping blanks as I learn.

I'm afraid of messing up as I learn.

But how can I learn without making mistakes? How can I try new things and see if I enjoy them if I am constantly holding myself back because I am afraid?

I (think) I know what I want, but I am afraid to go after it. It's big and scary and life-altering in a HUGE way. It would be easier to wait for things to unfold around me. To wait. To let life pass me by. 

Can I be happy, living the way I am right now? Maybe, if you believe happiness is a choice. 

Personally, I believe saying 'happiness is a choice' means you're probably lying to yourself.

I want the lies to stop. 

Word of the year

In my last post, I alluded to (but am not quite ready to blog about) the struggles I have had the past few months because I neglected my word of the year for 2017.

At the beginning of December, about the time I remembered that I was supposed to be being deliberate this year, I also realized that I was going to have a difficult time choosing my word for 2018.

It's been in the back of my mind for the past month. I've written down at least a dozen words that could be contenders, but none of them quite encompass everything that I am feeling.  Last night, I settled on a winner.

• Confidence  

• full trust; belief in the powers, trustworthiness, or reliability of a person or thing.
• belief in oneself and one's powers or abilities; self-confidence; self-reliance; assurance.
• a secret that is confided or imparted trustfully.

I'm about to do some really hard things this year. But I CAN do them. I am able. And I will.

Just what I needed

My winter school break is 2.5 weeks long. Our entire family already went to San Antonio for a few days to visit Matt's family for Christmas, but the boys and my break continues through this entire first week of January. They're content to stay home and play video games. I am not.

I booked a condo in the Ozarks for a few days, and a friend will be joining me tomorrow. My six hour drive landed me here, alone, late this afternoon.

and I. freaking. love. it.

I love being alone.

This is the first time I have been somewhere neutral, alone, since I can't remember when. It may have been more than 20 years ago.

As a college student, I would frequently drive to my family's cabin in the woods for the weekend. The 4 hour drive cleared my head, and the solitude of the weekend restored my soul. I didn't have to go anywhere, do anything, or talk to anyone. No one knew I was there. No one could bother me. I could eat what and when I wanted. I could stay up all night reading if I wanted to.  I could stroll through the woods. If I had been at home, I would have been caught up in the continuation of my regular life. Being alone, somewhere else, is absolutely liberating.

Even staying at a hotel, alone, evokes a different vibe. A hotel room feels confining and ultimately very temporary. A hotel is a quick stop on the way to somewhere else.

But this, this, is just what I needed, and I didn't even know it.


Much of what I am struggling with right now is my definition of happiness, and what I need to be happy. I am simultaneously reading/listening to 3 books that are all themed around love, marriage, and aloneness. This retreat could not have come at a better time as I grapple with these concepts.

Half a year later

As you can read from those last two posts, I did something at the end of July that took me in a completely different direction than I had anticipated.

Apparently, I had also intended to blog about my experiences teaching middle school on a separate blog (hence the two posts I just found)

But in the words of Sweet Brown- "ain't nobody got time for that."

Too much has happened in the last five months to even begin to write about it all, but let's just summarize with this statement:

I forgot about my word of the year.

I took a full-time teaching job on a whim- the exact opposite of being deliberate. It has proven to be a decision that I regret on an almost daily basis.

I completely forgot about this blog until about 6 weeks ago, and even then I only recalled my word of the year. I did not go back and read anything I had written on this blog until yesterday. And, y'all- I cannot begin to tell you the amount of heartache I could have saved myself if I had, because as I am rereading what I wrote in the first half of 2017, nearly everything that has happened since then is in direct contrast to what I intended.

Let's take away the "has happened" and be honest: these things did not just happen. I put myself in a place where I would let them happen, and in some cases even deliberately pursued them.

A few weeks ago, I realized that deliberate had irrevocably been thrown out the window, and there was no way to undo that.  And if you can't undo something, what can you do but keep moving forward? 

Today, especially, I am looking forward, but to do that I also need to take a long, deliberate look back. I didn't realize how much introspection I had done while writing here, and how therapeutic it is.

As I'm rereading my past year I'm intrigued to find that the end of summer/beginning of school seems to be a falling-off point in blogging for me, based on this post.

Lots to think about.