My Best Yes is Saying No, Often

We moved at the end of my third grade year, and I left a private Catholic school, where I was thriving, and doing very well, and entered into public school at the start of fourth grade. I left behind my friends, and started school as "the new girl", in a town that was rooted in old, established families and status. On top of being new, I came from "the city". A poor city at that, over the state border, and one with a bad reputation. I left a daily routine of wearing uniforms and attending mass on Fridays, and began having to choose what to wear each day, and pausing for a moment of silence after the Pledge of Allegiance. 

I struggled to make friends. I did not fit in to any of the already established "cliques", and I am an introvert by nature. Until a few years ago, I didn't even know what an introvert was. I took a personality quiz for school, and discovered I was an ISFJ; the nurturer. My son, a classic introvert, has known this about himself for many years. I am only starting to discover my true self over the last several years. A lonely, outcast girl, who was battling demons at home, I turned to books to escape. 

At school, I was what we would label an "average" student. The problem with labels is that they begin to define what we think of ourselves, and eventually we become the person that we have been labeled as. I struggled in math. I had a hard time with spelling. I didn't get any support at home, and I did the best that I could on my own. I never heard the words, "I am proud of you" come from my parents the entire time that I was growing up. When I graduated from high school, I had no faith that I would be accepted into college, or that I would receive any kind of financial aid to be able to afford to go. I did not understand how student loans worked, and I had no guidance to support me in making this all important decision. 

Fast-forward twenty-one years, and last fall I found myself enrolled at SNHU. Starting college, while working full time pushed me right out of my comfort zone. In the wake of the end stages of my friend's journey with cancer and the way she lived life to the fullest, especially during her last year, gave me the motivation I needed to pursue this dream I have harbored in the quiet of my heart for so many years. 

It has not been an easy road. Finding the balance between working, taking two classes every eight weeks, and caring for my house has not been easy. Sometimes I feel like I have it all under control and others it all seems to fall apart. On top of that, I am still working hard at rebuilding my relationship into something better than it has ever been. My priorities right now, are my marriage, my family, and school work. After that comes my job, and my house. Everything else is falling to the wayside. 

Being a type-A first born, with OCPD tendencies, this has not been an easy adjustment. To walk through my house and see rugs that haven't been vacuumed in a week, or dust that has been accumulating on flat surfaces for two weeks or longer gives me an enormous twitch. When I realize that I have spent an entire day working, then doing school work, and it's time for bed and I haven't spend any quality time with my husband, is especially challenging. When we start to have many of those days in a row, I find that my mood starts to deteriorate. My love language is quality time, and even though I'm the reason my needs are not being met, I have to stop and make time for us to spend together, so that I can keep going with the important work that needs to be done. 

Right now, I need to focus on me, and my school work, which seems selfish, but it is where I have been called to be at this point in my life. In order to do this, I have to say no to meetings, and social commitments. I have to say no to going for walks with friends after work as much as I want to catch up and visit. I have to say no to movies with my family that start late, and keep me from being able to get up early to get my school work done before leaving for work. I have to say no, so that I can say yes to this calling that I have taken on, because that is where I am right now.

 It is not where I will be forever. This season will pass, and I will be able to say yes again, to those things that I cannot find time for right now. Right now, however, my best yes is an answer to being asked to step outside of my comfort zone, and pursue my dreams, even though I was scared. I said yes, and intend to be more than just an "average" student. I am giving college my best, even if in order to do so, I have to keep saying no. 

On Being Kept by a Chicken

For five days this summer I was kept by a chicken. She showed up in the early morning hours of a late Saturday in June.

I was delivering K-2 school supplies that I have been storing for several years now to my neighbor across the way who is going to be teaching Kindergarten next year. The amount of centers and games I have made over the years, flashcards and worksheets, and themed units I have put together was intense to see all accumulated together. Packing it up and giving it away was admitting to myself that I will not be teaching elementary school, and letting go of that dream. It was realizing that the mandated testing they are imposing on our kids has sucked the fun out of learning and teaching, and that is not the direction I want to take my career, or my life. Giving it to my friend, to give her a start on her first year of Kindergarten, when she has only taught first grade and Title 1, was awesome. I know that my crazy OCD organization and all that time and work I put into those monthly files, and the centers that I used with her son, actually, when he was in first grade, will be a huge help and blessing for her.

I was overdressed for the day, in fleece pants and a hoody, and had my sherpa slippers from LLBean on. I had lugged about six or seven large totes across the street (she lives diagonally across, so it's a bit of a walk), and had one last tote to go. I saved the heaviest bag for last. The one with all the early learning worksheets in it, organized by month, from McMillan. Three kits worth, and it was going to take every last bit of energy that I did not have that day to lug that thing over to her house. I walked into my kitchen, got a glass of water, and sat on a stool at the counter to regroup first. While I was sitting there drinking my water, The Boy rushed through the porch door, into the kitchen and dropped the mail onto the counter. "Do you see what's going on in the back yard?" he asked, breathlessly. I might have gave him a little 'tude as I explained what I had been doing, when a simple no would have sufficed. He told me to go look. I asked if it could wait until I had lugged the last tote across the street, and he said no. I knew he meant business, so I walked across the house and looked out the windows. Nothing. More than annoyed, I asked what the heck I was supposed to be seeing, and he led me out the back door into the yard.

Through His Eyes

Summer is drawing to a near, and with it, the end of the last term of my freshmen year of college. I had this grand idea that over the summer I would be able to get my house spring cleaned, relax, and take some time to enjoy the great outdoors, which I have missed horribly since beginning my coursework in October. What I did not realize was how intense these last two classes were going to be. I will be forever grateful that I managed to schedule them together, over the summer, and that we planned well,  and I was able not to have to work this summer.

Next week, I am going away for four days with my man to celebrate our nineteenth wedding anniversary, and to recharge my relationship. Due to some health issues that I've been having since the start of the year, planning for our trip this year has been more than a little difficult, to the point of almost wishing we weren't going. Things have managed to fall into our place, and I cannot wait to sit in the sun, play our traditional round of mini-golf (our first date was at a mini-golf place), and just enjoy spending time together, alone. We have talking to do, and dreams to share, and memories to make. I have realized that as we keep journeying forward in rebuilding our relationship, it's not about looking backwards, it's about constantly moving forward, and starting over, each day.

In a very low moment that I had recently, I asked him on the brink of tears, that if he knew I would end up so broken, health-wise, if he would have still married me. He took my face in his hands, looked me in the eyes, and said, "Absolutely." He meant it from the bottom of his heart. I get caught up in thinking of how he must miss out on us being able to go out on dinner dates, as he loves to go out to eat, or how my food issues have changed our nightly dinners (even though they are more healthy), and I feel in some secret place in my heart, that he must resent me. Crazy, yes. He doesn't harbor a resentful bone in his body, but I do sometimes, and I project that onto him. I think that because I feel so awful, and broken, and like I'm a mess, that he must see me that same way too. He doesn't. He looks at me, and somehow, through the sharp pointy edges and sunken features, he sees the beautiful woman he fell in love with all those years ago. I wish I could see myself through his eyes, if only for a moment.