Day 5: A TV Show / Movie

 

A movie I'm grateful for is The Princess Bride.  The kids are finally old enough, as a group, that we can start watching some of the movies that were my favorites as a kid.  Some of them hold up better than others.  This one is a great blend of comedy, adventure, fairy tale, and lots of quotable lines.  ("Wild Hearts Can't Be Broken" is another banger in this same category.)  This gratitude series seems to be taking on a nostalgic theme - we'll see if it continues :).  I'm grateful for movies that bring back good memories for me, and that I can enjoy all over again with my family.  

Day 4: A Type of Food

 

Today, I'm grateful for luxurious breakfast foods.  The kind that someone took the time to cook up hot, and that usually people sit around a table together and eat.  The kind that usually means weekends, holidays, special occasions, or camping.  (At least for us - weekdays are throw together something easy, like toast or oatmeal.)  The kind that would usually be called dessert, if you weren't eating it before 10 am.  

My absolute number one pick for luxurious breakfast would be banana chocolate chip pancakes and scrambled eggs with spinach and goat cheese mixed in.  But I'm also grateful for anything else in this delicious category.  

Day 3: An Album

 

An album I'm grateful for is "Jagged Little Pill" by Alanis Morissette.  This album came out in 1995 and stayed influential through the late 90s - right when I was in high school.

This album is packed with emotion - anger, wistfulness, love, sadness, a whole gamut.  And like with all the best music, you can really feel these emotions through her words and melodies.  It helped me work out the big feelings that come with the teenage years, and to see that music is a great place to turn when you want to work through the ups and downs of emotion.  

Another thing I love about this album is that it's quality songs from start to finish - a rarity always, but more so now than ever in the age of streaming music.  It was so great to put on a CD and listen to and enjoy the whole thing from start to finish.  

A Place

Today's prompt is:  think about a place you're grateful for.  I'm grateful for trails.  I love the feeling of discovery around every bend.  I love getting to see crazy rocks formations coming out of the top of a mountain and thinking about what geological event happened to make that formation.  I love walking through a desert landscape and seeing a flower appear to break up the brown and sagebrush.  I love waterfalls, big and small.  I love the sounds of birds, wind rustling through trees, babbling brooks.  I love the combination of nature, sunshine, and movement.  I love the type of easy conversation that comes when you hike as a group.  I love the silence of hiking alone.  I love running a trail that you've done a hundred times before and knowing the trees and canyons along the way like friends.  I love nature trails that tell you a new fact every quarter mile or so.  Cheers to trails!

Day 1: A Happy Memory

I'm starting up another gratitude challenge, and this year I'm going to extend the time parameters from Memorial Day to Labor Day, taking on a couple each week.  As always, I would love it if anyone wants to participate along with me!  I will put the full list at the bottom of this post.

The first day is:  "What is a happy memory you're grateful for?"  This is an easy one.  Since tomorrow is our 18th wedding anniversary, I'm grateful for the memory of our wedding weekend.  Kenny and I got married on May 27, 2006 at the Nebraska State Capitol in Lincoln, NE.  Kenny's family and friends are from Reno, and at the time we were going to school in North Carolina, so we had people traveling in from all over the country to join the celebration.  At age 25, I only had the smallest idea of what a special, unusual thing it is to have so many of your loved ones gathered in one place, and what an honor it is that people take the time and trouble to come witness your special event.  I also had only the smallest idea of what a big thing it is that someone promises to be your partner, through better or worse, for the rest of their life.  But I did have lots of love for the funny, smart, handsome, faithful man that I was going to get to call husband.

I was never one to dream about the details of my wedding - thinking about that kind of thing stresses me out.  I was in the middle of my 2nd year of law school and honestly found wedding planning exponentially more stressful than my law school classes.  Fortunately, my mom and sister were super helpful in the planning process.  I wore the same wedding dress my sister wore the year before, used many of her same vendors, and took as much of their advice as I could.  Thanks largely to them, the rehearsal dinner, wedding, and reception were just what I hoped they would be.  Lots of laughs, food, good conversation, hugs, and dancing with our favorite people.  A wonderful way to launch into married life.

And I'm grateful to Kenny for putting up with me for all this time, and to God for His provision in our marriage.  Cheers to 18 years!

Strong and Courageous - How?

This month, my memory verse group (led by my friend Kim, the inspiration for countless blog posts) has been thinking about the verse Joshua 1:9, which says, "Have I not commanded you?  Be strong and courageous.  Do not be afraid; do not be discouraged, for the Lord your God will be with you wherever you go."  I absolutely love this verse, and I thought of it often when Joshua was going through all the surgeries and medical stuff.  And this month, it's been an encouragement in a whole new way.  

Whenever I'm going through a transitional time in my life, like I am right now (see previous two posts), there are always moments of fear and discouragement.  Always.  And I don't think I'm alone in this.  It's hard to move out of your comfort zone; it's hard to be the beginner and have to learn new systems and ask questions and look foolish; it's hard to be on the learning curve.  All of us go through these times in life, whether it's a new job, a new city, or a new life stage.  This verse, and some others that relate, are perfect for these transitional times.  

The verse tells us to be strong and courageous rather than frightened and dismayed, but how are we supposed to get this strength and courage?

• The first answer is right in the verse - "the Lord your God is with you wherever you go."  I don't have to look to my own strength to fight fear - I can look to the one who travels with me wherever I go, who faces every discouragement by my side - and who is infinitely more powerful than any of those things.
• Here is a related verse that takes the concept even farther:  "The Lord will fight for you; you need only to be still." (Exodus 14:14)  This verse comes from the story where the Israelites have just escaped Egyptian slavery, and the Egyptians are chasing them down, and they run into a dead end at the Red Sea -- but then God parts the Red Sea, lets the Israelites through, and stops the Egyptians in decisive fashion.  Neither the Israelites nor the Egyptians could've possibly imagined this is how the story was going to go.  It's a good reminder that I don't need to know all the details of how my life story is going to play out, and in fact I'm going to be a lot better off if I trust and be still and enjoy the ride.
•   If I was going to get another tattoo, it would say "Be Still" as a reminder of this verse.  (Either that or matching Celtic tattoos with my sister.)  (But not going to get tattooed.)
• Another verse that acknowledges how heavy the burdens of fear and discouragement can be, and how God takes those things on for us:  "Come to me, all you who are weary and heavy burdened, and I will give you rest."  (Matthew 11:28)  God never promises us an easy life.  He understands that the burdens life throws at us are heavy.  But He does offer rest in the midst of life's challenges.
• Finally, a reminder that this piece of the story we're living in is just a tiny sliver of the bigger story:  "Fear not; I am the first and the last." (Revelation 1:17).  God has been there since the beginning, and He will be there in the end.  He is working all the events of history, including all the pieces of our individual lives, towards a larger redemptive story.  Remembering the bigger story helps us relativize any fear or discouragement we're feeling right now as temporal, momentary, passing. 

These are the thoughts I'm having this month on how to be strong and courageous.  As always, would love to hear any further thoughts! 

Back to Work - How's It Going?

I am about one month into the working life, so I thought I'd write a follow up blog about how things are going.  There are two parts to it - the return to work after such a long break, and the combining homeschool with work - so I'll split it up that way.    

Lawyer hours

What It's Like to Go Back to Work After 13 Years

This has been a mix of all kinds of emotions:

• The first time back to anything significant feels like jumping in the deep end of a freezing cold pool.  The first time back at court.  The first time drafting a pleading.  Etc.  But then you do it, and you survive, and it's exhilarating to be back at it.
• There are moments where it feels frustrating to be this far along in life and this early in the career.  Like, I shouldn't be asking the most beginner of questions in the same year where it might be time to get bifocals.   
• It's satisfying to get back into the legal world - it feels like an important part of my mind is coming back.  I want to be clear here - stay at home parents, and particularly homeschool parents, are using their brains a ton - that could be a whole separate post - but it's not the same type of thinking as legal analysis.  
• It feels good to be contributing financially to the family, even though Kenny's still taking on the bulk of that responsibility.  

The main thing that's been really different this time v. 13 years ago is how much remote work changes the entire nature of the job.  This job used to be much more social.  I chatted with my colleagues in their offices at least a couple times per day; talked to the other lawyers we go up against before and after court; saw the other people who are part of this work at meetings.  Now, pretty much all of it takes place by Zoom, and the in-between social interaction with people has disappeared.  There are definitely some positives to this, but it's striking what a difference it makes.    

What It's Like to Balance Homeschool and Work

Homeschool hours

The first couple weeks were unbelievably exhausting, but as I settle in, the hours are balancing out about like I hoped they would.  Half the day goes to school and half the day goes to law, and I try to keep it pretty separate.  Occasionally I have to take a work call during school hours, or I might work on the homeschool library list while I'm sitting in the Zoom waiting room for court, but in general it's helpful to keep them as two different worlds.  

Both lawyer and homeschool mom are an identity, and those identities are pretty hilariously different.  How you act, what you do, what it's expected the whole rest of your life is like.  I actually love this part of it, as both sides feel like a piece of who I am, and neither feels like the entire thing.  The things that are stressful in each are different, so one provides relief to the other, going both ways.  And the things that are rewarding in each are different, and the contrast helps bring out the positives.  

The thing that feels hardest is that these are both primary gigs.  They are both my priority.  They are both things where I'm continuing to puzzle about how to do it better or how to fix a particular problem or what I have left undone after the actual "work hours" are over.  On a day to day scheduling basis, law wins - you can't skip court because you have a previously scheduled homeschool group - and luckily, homeschool is flexible enough that it mostly works out fine to flex around the more set law schedule.  But looking at how things have worked out over a whole week, or a whole month - if there's not enough time and energy to get them both done well, then it's not going to be okay to keep doing both.  Thankfully, so far so good.

On good days, I feel so blessed to have this life.  I can't believe that it's worked out that I still get to have this very significant chunk of time with my kids, get to educate them the way I want, get to continue on this path that has worked so well for us.  But still somehow also get to resume life as a lawyer in a significant way and work a job that I really enjoy.  On days where one or both pieces are hard, I feel overwhelmed.  But really, this is not so different from all the other working and / or homeschooling parents out there! 

There are lots of other homeschool parents who work, so I'd be interested to hear from any of you how you what you think about the balance.  And friends who have gone back to work after years of staying at home with young kids - I would love to hear your thoughts on that.