“I don’t want to go to school.”
“Why don’t you want to go to school.”
“Because…because school is not my jam.”
As I repeated her words back to her, I started to laugh and a grin brightened her face. Then I got corny.
“School’s not your peanut butter?”
“That doesn’t even make sense,” she dryly replied.
What does make sense is that a month isn’t enough time to feel settled into the rhythms of a new school year. Though classmates are the same, the teacher is different, the work is more challenging, rain the last two days has meant that recess was in the gym, this year recess comes before lunch instead of after, and the days go by too quickly. I get it. And as resilient as children are, I’m not expecting mine to bounce contentedly along.
I know I’m not. Yes, I’m with my family and we live in a miracle-story house. I have friends who live here, friends I’ve known and have kept in touch with for years. I like my coworkers. Being part of a team of pastors is fantastic. I get to focus a lot on discipleship and engaging in rich conversation about God fills my heart. Even helping people plan funerals is a reminder that I’m able to work in my own skin with gifts God planted in me long before I’d even thought about working in a church.
But most every member is still very new to me and I to them. We don’t yet have inside jokes. Most of them haven’t eaten in my home.
I don’t attend monthly interfaith clergy meetings or meet up at a local café for lunch with other women pastors from a variety of denominations, a few of whom kept me from vocationally drowning.
I don’t have a neighbor that I shoot the breeze with or share a meal with or ponder deep questions with or ask to watch my kids.
Most drives are 30 minutes long or close to it and I still use the GPS because multiple accidents and morning traffic too often co-exist. I have learned that not using the GPS lowers my stress level, but I hardly ever leave the house early enough so that not being able to re-route won’t make me terribly late.
The other day, we rode our bikes through a neighborhood and one of the houses brought to mind a subdivision in Athens, Georgia that has a lot of lights up at Christmastime. I suddenly missed knowing that we’ll plan to drive through there one December evening after the kids have showered and are in their pajamas, bundled in their winter coats and hats. A year and four months isn’t enough time to feel settled into the rhythms of a new city.
It’s not my first move. From what I can remember, it’s the 11th move from one city to another. Two cities are repeats but at very different stages of my life. The house and apartment moves within the same city probably get me to at least 17. When I was child, I envied people who grew up in one house and didn’t leave it until college or marriage. There was I time I could only envision myself living somewhere for four years. Then I lived in Knoxville, Tennessee for eight and Athens for six and a half.
I know how to move. I also know that it doesn’t get easier on my heart. I’ve become smarter about packing and purging, about when to hire others to do a cleaning job and when to do it myself. But I can’t say that I’ve learned how to feel settled faster. I do know how to miss the familiar things that I never imagined missing, things I wouldn’t have thought would be markers of stability and peace, like Christmas light sightings.
Or the bends in certain roads.
Or our house packed with our kids’ classmates each year for their birthday parties, the grassy hill over and under which utility lines were run and the path through it that a retired neighbor mowed into existence, buying and arranging flowers on Friday afternoons from Trader Joe’s for the church sanctuary, walking my dog most mornings.
There are at least 33 things I’m happy to be without. And many things I knew I’d miss. Yet lately it’s what I didn’t know I treasured that’s showing up at odd moments and creating in me a jealousy toward the lives I used to live.
Tomorrow, my child may still not want to go to school and I will still complain about travel time. So right now, I’m choosing gratitude, gratitude for the little moments that help to create big memories of stability and peace.
Moving is so hard! Yes, I get it! It will take a lot to move me out of our current place. I love all the things that make this area special. But it took time!
This is an excellent reminder to be purposefully grateful and keep things in perspective for myself. I have moved so many times, and yet the last move was so long ago now, because this is a place that I have lived in the longest in my entire life. Now, moving seems like a huge life project, whereas before, it seemed normal or even expected. I think a newly renewed focus on gratitude would be good for me, so thank you for the reminder.
I hope you continue to find new things that anchor you in your new city, little by little.
Loved this reflection on the impact that moving to a new location has on our lives. It resonates with me. Glad you recognize the challenges for your kids and that you give each other grace as you adjust to new realities while still missing the familiar.