I went to work and was needed (like no one at home needed me?) and I was good at what I did ('cause I suck at parenting? Am a lousy cook? Keep a crappy home? Okay, that last one was just to see if you were paying attention...) and I made people laugh (you know how serious we are in Schlusserdom, so nice change?) and I made people feel good about themselves( as you know I live to tear my family down?) and I wasn't lonely...at all (wait...that one. Yes, that one.)
It was nice to have someone notice my skill. It was nice to have someone NOT have heard all of my stories and to get to create new ones. It was so nice to be a grownup professional once again. It was all so nice....
So why am I leaving? Be it this school or five others, not being lonely at work was just what this ego, self, me, myself and I needed or at least wanted....so what.....
I don't think it is that my house is one commercial break away from a very special episode of Hoarders. I am not even sure it was that Maggie has stories to tell and I found myself not caring to hear them. It wasn't just that dinner was turning into peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. No, there was this call, you know the one. The one that starts out as an inkling and turns into a hunch until one day, you sit in your car knowing what you have to do next.
Some not so nice events happened. But honestly, I think the Holy Spirit was holding me to my inkling/hunch/knowing: "No temptation has overtaken you except what is common to mankind. And God is faithful; he will not let you be tempted beyond what you can bear. But when you are tempted, he will also provide a way out so that you can endure it." 1 Corinthians 10:13...yeah, that's what happened.
There was nothing French in that temptation mind you, just being clear here. No, it was much darker than that: Me. It was my universe and it very simply orbited me. Now, I know that I am a nurse and so by nature, I serve...but because that is what I do, it served my ID...or whatever that part of my soul that looks only at me and my needs....oh wait...I think that is called sin. Yeah, probably...and I fell in love with it.
Once upon a time I wrote about how family is never an interruption of ministry. AND my family was not...but my ministry, as nurse, was an interruption of my ministry as wife and mother, my first loves. I have had to be brutally honest here: I suck at doing it all. I mean, suck. I can honestly say, I never once left work at work. Nope, not once.
Being an all or nothing kind of girl, I have no doubt that I still have some growing up to do. I will work again. There are better ways to make more money in less time than being a school nurse...and for the first time in forever, I am okay with being lonely at work and even being alone at home. It is okay, not because I don't still love an audience (like that will ever happen!) I just don't need one to feed that ID thing. Funny that I didn't know that ID thing was a thing...until I did.
Saying goodbye sucks when your heart doesn't want to say goodbye. But in the sweet by and by of it all, I have remembered that my heart is deceitful above all things as David reminds me. I can't follow my heart, it would lead me down the hall to my office, I would put on a pot of coffee, turn on my computer and ignore all that I had just written.
So say goodbye I must, and I cry I will. That is okay, my eyes look great when I cry...(that was a me moment, in case you missed it) I didn't do my best, but I had a ball sucking at it and maybe it was just the reminder that my sometimes haughty-taughty spirit needed. In the end, I think my Jesus and I have a few things to celebrate and I remembered that He is far too crazy about me to leave me to my own fleshy self. I rest knowing that He has a plan and I am not planning on missing it for the lessor portion any more.
I am still crashing the Christmas party though...try and stop me!
