On Letting Go

Letting go is scary.

There is comfort in holding onto something, even after it is gone.  The past few months for me have felt like I still had my foot in the door, keeping it from closing completely.  Watching through the crack with a small glimmer of hope... but for what?  Shutting that door firmly and not looking back... there's finality and sadness in it.  But that is followed by peace.  Relief.  When you stop looking back, then you can finally look ahead.  See the amazing opportunities that are out there... the doors that are STILL open to you, or waiting for you to open them.

I don't want to spend my life looking back.  Living with what-ifs and could-haves and should-haves.  There is too much life to be lived for that.

And so I have let go.  Finally.

Heartbreak

I really do know how to set myself back.  I am in dire need of a reset of some sort.

I still haven't decided if I simply know my limits in a relationship, or if I really know how to sabotage something really good.  Something real.

Either way, I'm back to square one.

And I just want a break.

I am tired of being alone.  Plain and simple.  My life is very full, it is very good.  Don't get me wrong.  I have a good job, I have wonderful friends, I have my health and my fitness.  I have what I need along with many things I don't need.  And while I don't look for a man to fulfill everything in my life, I am ready for someone who can complement the life that I have.  Someone who can make it better... who can make me better, and vice versa.

I have a feeling that I have given up that chance, at least for a long time.  I certainly don't get over people easily, and I don't move on easily.

I don't really know what the next step for me is.  I suppose for now, just putting one foot in front of the other.  I think of Sleepless in Seattle when Sam is still reeling over his loss.  "Well, I'm gonna get out of bed every morning... breathe in and out all day long.  Then after awhile I won't have to remind myself to get out of bed every morning and breathe in and out... and then after awhile I won't have to think about how I had it great and perfect for awhile."  That's what I'm gonna do.

I have peace... but right now I don't have joy about it.  And that's ok.  I'm going to let myself be sad.

A Wonderful Week

I just got back from a wonderful trip to the Midwest to visit family.  My sister Melissa just graduated nursing school, so I flew in the night before her pinning ceremony.  It was a wonderful, wonderful week.  My entire family was there for Melissa's ceremony, and even a few cousins, aunts, uncles, and my grandparents made it over!

The next day we headed over to the farm where my grandparents live.  It was just a relaxing time visiting, going to a bridal shower, lots and lots of family time, and a celebration of my grandparents' 65th anniversary.  Let me tell you, these two people are amazing.  I love them with all my heart and am so thankful to have them as my grandparents.  And after 65 years together, they are still in love!  I pray we still have many more left with them.  So many good times to be had yet!

I'm home and am definitely feeling a little (or a lot) homesick for family.  Though I love Spokane, I do miss the family connections and warm familiarity.  After the mess of the past year (as far as my relationship, break-up, and finally beginning the healing process) there was something so comforting in just being with family.  Relaxing on the farm, shared moments of laughter and joy with my grandma, (who is always finding something to laugh about!) long country runs, seeing cousins I haven't seen in years.  It's like while the past year and a half has changed me, grown me, stretched me, challenged me... I still have these roots.

Today I'm sad for the time with family I feel I am missing by living all the way out here.  The thing is, in Florida I didn't get any more time with family in the Midwest than I have while living here.  I suppose it just seemed a trip there was easier when made from Florida.  I definitely want to be more intentional about visiting my family there.  Yes, it's a longer trip and yes, a little more expensive.  And that's not what has kept me from visiting more often.  But life just gets busy and you don't make the time you should for those things.  I'm just realizing how much I really miss being part of family gatherings.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not second-guessing whether or not it is right for me to live here.  I still love my home in Spokane and don't intend on leaving anytime soon.  But I am resolving to be more intentional about getting back for visits and family gatherings.  I do work in a job that provides the time and means for more frequent visits than I have been doing.  Of course life happens and it's hard to make the time, but I will be more intentional about it.

I am home from a wonderful trip up to see family. Immediately after work on Saturday, I went to the airport to fly to St. Louis. It was wonderful to walk into my aunt and uncle's house and be greeted by familiarity and the ones I love. Christmas Day was wonderful, complete with my cousin Matt and his wife, Susan with their little girl Theresa (it wasn't long before "Santa Claus" came for a visit!") My other aunt and uncle visited for the afternoon as well, along with my cousin Jonathan. Wonderful, wonderful to see him!! He is doing so well, defied the odds we didn't know if he would beat.

We spent a few nights in the country at my grandparents' house. About 58 people were present, with 25 missing. Very wonderful to be with all of them. Our last night we played the game "Would You Rather?" making my Grandma read off the cards. She is hilarious, and it was one of the best nights of laughter I've ever had.

More and more I see the importance of family-- imperfections and all. I have struggled recently with the changes we are experiencing, the issues of transitioning from child to adult family relationships, among other things. My heart has filled with peace and forgiveness this week, that my burden is lighter and my outlook so much brighter. I realized that it is what it is, it was what it was, and I can make choices to be something else... that I am not destined to a life of bitterness and anger. Nobody or nothing can make me bitter or angry without my allowing for it to be so. What a freeing thought!

Happy New Year! I wonder what 2012 will bring?

I haven't talked much about my trip up north. I suppose I will now.

I got up there the 1st, and I guess I did write some about it while I was there. Melissa works a late shift, often not getting home until about 1 am. So we would stay up until 3 or 4 each night, watching movies or tv shows or SNL digital shorts on the computer. Each day while she was at work, I would go to visit my Grandma in the hospital, which was such a sweet time. We would just talk, sit quietly, watch tv, or take naps. Nothing special, really, but it was special because it was with Grandma. I really thought she was getting better at that time. Looking back, I don't know if it really seemed like she was, or if I was just blinded to the reality of it all.

On Saturday the 5th, a whole bunch of the family helped move some of Grandma's furniture from her house to the assisted living facility where she was to be moving the following Monday. That was a fun time with family, and the next day Grandma gave us money to go to Applebee's for lunch because she wanted us all to have that time together. It was a good time together, just talking, laughing, reminiscing, looking to the future, that kind of thing. Would we have wanted to know what was coming, to be prepared? I don't think so, but it is a bittersweet thing to look back on that time: such joy and happiness and reunion followed by sadness and good-byes.

Melissa and I talk about how that first week seems like an eternity ago, like another lifetime.

Monday Melissa and I took a drive up to see my other grandparents for the day, which was awesome. On the way over we did get a worried phone call from our Aunt Marietta, who had picked Grandma up from the hospital and said things didn't look like they were going well. It was on our drive home that night we found out she was re-admitted through the ER, non-responsive, and we were told that "this is it."

This is it. Those words hold a lot of tragedy and weight in this situation... it being the end. It being good bye, even if only for a little while. It being the end of an era in our family. It being the possible beginning to a new era, which has yet to be determined. It being no more Grandma and Grandpa in our lives. It being the task of letting go... which I have come to find the hardest part of grief.

Letting go of Christmases I once knew... walks in the neighborhood with Grandma and Grandpa... trips to the lighthouse, or Okefenokee Swamp, or Kingsley Plantation... peaches from across the river... walks back and forth down the street between cousins' and grandparents'... so, so many more memories. Yet, those things were already gone. I knew we were never going to have them back, but it seems that with Grandma and Grandpa being gone, there is a true end to it all. And I feel like if I let go, with that it's gone. I have to move on, and I don't want to move on. I would rather be sad and remember, than happy and forget. And I know we aren't supposed to forget, but I also know that I'm too sentimental and it's dangerous for me to get lost in memories.

I feel like I sound really dramatic. I sound like I'm drowning in my sorrows, and I suppose I kind of am. The reality is, I really don't know how to deal with grief at all. How do life and death exist simultaneously? It's as if there's a curtain between them, and at any given moment anyone can slip to the other side with no return. I'm so glad I can rest in the knowledge that these two wonderful people I love are in the presence of Jesus. That is the comfort in all of this. But the part I hate is that we who are left behind miss them so much. We have to go on without them, these wonderful people who have always been there. Life goes on. The world doesn't stop turning, but I feel like I've stopped functioning. I feel as though for three months I've lived like this, and I don't know how to get out of it. I've hardly even hung out with friends, except those I've known longest who let me just sit and cry.

On the upside, I did go and get my oil changed today. And I'm going to get some grocery shopping done here in a little bit, so life has yet to yield some productivity. I'm sad, but I know God is good. It doesn't mean He's going to fix my problems, or somehow give me a magical happy pill. I have to learn to lean on Him and trust Him in all of this... and maybe that is what I have to learn from it. "Those who sow in tears will reap with songs of joy. He who goes out weeping, carrying seed to sow, will return with songs of joy, carrying sheaves with him." -Psalm 126:5&6 I'm praying that from this I will one day reap with a song of joy...

My heart has an aching today for things that once were.

Being six years old, standing only as high as my grandma's waist, helping her bake in the kitchen.

Just nine years old, taking walks with Grandma and Grandpa up and down the street, talking, laughing, just being. Being so oblivious to the pains and heartaches of life.

Eleven years old, eating fresh, sweet peaches in Grandma's kitchen. Grandma peeled the entire peach for me because I couldn't stand the fuzzy peach peels.

Fifteen, being embarrassed because my grandparents wanted me to play the piano in front of our entire extended family. But I knew they were so proud of me.

Seventeen, Grandma and Grandpa here for my graduation. The last time they visited us in Florida. You know, the 1000 miles never seemed to bother them when it came to seeing us.

Twenty, listening to how proud my grandparents were when I got into nursing school.

Twenty-one, talking on the phone with my grandma and hearing her voice break as she talks to me about her dying sister, my dear Aunt Georgia. I still remember her telling me, "We just want to sit and cry over these things, but we just can't spend all our time crying!" I will tell you one thing, that advice has come in handy in recent months.

Twenty-three: I told Grandma I couldn't accept that Grandpa was dying, and she told me we had to, and that life couldn't go on forever. That is advice I still can't handle.

I feel like part of my little girl heart is dying, or at least transforming. So much of me has remained a naive child even into my adult life, for I have never had to experience any heartaches or real sorrows or loss in my life. I can't accept these changes, inevitable though they may be, that have come and are yet to come. My heart yearns for the past that is no more.

I have always struggled with accepting change in life. Lately even the little things have gotten to me- my home church changing the sign out front last month, this month the format of the bulletins. No, no I want the sign in front of the church to be the old brick on I used to climb on when I was little. The flashy new sign just won't cut it. You have taken away another useless constant in my life.

"He who was seated on the throne said, "I am making everything new!" -Revelation 21:5
This is the truth. He IS making everything new, and right now it just feels like a painful process. I once heard someone say that with each person you love who goes to heaven, your heart begins to slowly but surely part with the world. It is painful. This world is not all that there is. This pain will one day be a memory, or maybe we won't even remember it. These tears will one day be wiped away by the hands of my Savior.

I love my dad.

He's a quiet man, a man of few words. He isn't always the best at showing emotion. But one thing I know about him, is that he is good. And I've never doubted his love for me.

The thing about my dad that people don't know, is he is brilliant. The man has a Master's in organic chemistry. He is a hard worker, and has always provided for us. He is also hilarious. No, he's not going to be the center of attention at a party (can you tell I get my personality from him?) but there is so much more to him than that. He's pretty cool.

When I was little, I used to tell him, "You're pretty, Daddy." I remember saying it, and not realizing that men aren't pretty, but handsome. Of course, I suppose in my little girl mind that was the highest compliment I probably could have paid him.

He called (and still calls) me Buggy. Which, in turn, led to a slew of variations on that nick name by my sister Melissa, who now calls me "Sto." How you get from Bug to Sto, is a loooong story. Just go with it, ok?

He also used to say good night to me by saying, "I love you, Butter Bean." And then I would respond, "I love you, Butter Dad." Then, "I love you, Butter Buggy," and "I love you, Butter Daddy." This was something that continued probably even into high school, until, I'm sad to say, I decided I was much too old for. I think that when I told him that, he was sad.

I haven't always been the best daughter to my dad. There are a lot of things about my attitude through the years that I wish I could take back. He still loves me, and even if he isn't the most overt at showing it, I don't doubt it.

That's what I love about my parents. Even when I'm most unloving, they love me. Unconditionally. I feel so blessed.

I read today in a magazine: "Curly hair shows an air of mystery and a lot of spunk."

Ha! I'd like to think that describes me, but it doesn't. Mainly I'm just a boring, quiet girl. And that's ok. I do boring all right.

Something I have recently discovered about myself: I don't have a lot of friends, and I'm ok with that. I'm ok with being Nat, the same old Nat I was 10 years ago except now I have the little letters RN behind my name, 4 years of college behind me, 1 and 1/2 years of nursing. Still a somewhat bratty little sister when you pair me with my oldest Melissa, and still a bossy know-it-all when you pair me with my little sister Hannah. I'd like to think that I've changed and grown up a lot, and while I have, I am finding myself more and more in tune with my roots and all that my parents taught me. Yes, even my mom's strict rules and standards. They seem to follow me around everywhere I go.

If you had asked me 2 years ago, or even 1 year ago, I would have told you I was ready to get the heck out of Dodge-- Dodge being Florida. More and more I'm realizing how much I want to be around my parents more and more. More and more I'm finding that they shaped me in great ways, and I carry it with me always.

Silly little sayings like, "If you can't say anything nice, don't say anything at all." Do you know how many times that once-thought-stupid saying comes into my mind in every day life? Another one she used to say, before we would leave for a friend's house, or camp, or just an evening activity away from home, and resonates with me always:

"Remember who you belong to."

That person being, of course, Jesus Christ. I used to get so annoyed when she would say that. Ok, Mom, got it. I know I belong to God. But now, that is something I carry not just to a party, or a trip away from home, but everywhere. She told that to us, in order that we would remember we were precious children of God's, and to conduct ourselves in a manner worthy of that.

I could probably give you an entire list of those sayings my mom used to tell us. Some of them I learned came from her own father. I suppose I'll probably turn out to be just like my own mom- a woman with high standards, high expectations, and high morals. I know I have a long ways to go to get there. I think I'm way too selfish right now to be in any way compared to my mom, but I'll tell you something I'm proud of: the fact that when people who know my mom meet me, they immediately say: "I knew you belonged to Kathy." And someday, I hope it isn't just my mom's looks that get me those compliments, but my conduct.

I didn't really mean for this post to be all about my mom, but I suppose lately she's been on my mind a lot and I've found myself more and more thankful every day that she's mine. The thing about my mom is, she loves me even when I'm terribly unloving. I hate to sound cliche, but my mom is such an example of Christ's love in my life. And I thank God for that.