Thursday, October 10, 2013

SAYING GOODBYE: PART II [A LINK UP]

Untitled

Hi there! Hope you are having a wonderful day! Last week I linked up with Casey Leigh and  started the "goodbye" story. I'm linking up again, and finishing the story. 

It was nice to look back over the early years of our lives together. This is not the best picture of this home, but this was our last home in VA, this time, it was in Norfolk. 

I found out that I got into the program February 2011 and Robert started school a year and some change prior. We would both be making the 30 minute commute daily, and the gas prices were a risin'. So we started looking casually, thinking we would move that summer.  We found an apartment within a week, and signed a lease. We moved in April 2nd to this dreamy little duplex in midtown Norfolk. It was on a sleepy little street with a little park and within a 5 minute walk of a Starbucks. 

A month after moving in, we found out we were pregnant! Definitely NOT what was in my plans. (You get that part, MY plans). I was freaking out, to say the very least. My neat tidy little plan was all tied up in a bow: I was going to finish school, and we were going to move, and I was going to get a great job, and then go back to school, and then get another great job, and maybe have kids when I was 40. Yowza. Well I don't like to admit it often (even though this in and of itself is laughable) but I was WRONG. 

I still hadn't figured out how awesome it would be to have a baby, I was working full time as  a director of an art camp and I was on my feet ALL DAY LONG on concrete floors, in the middle of summer. Only you ladies who've been pregnant will get that one. It was not awesome. 

The summer came to an end, and I was about to start school. I still had no clue HOW I was going to do this whole grad school thing at this point- still definitely freaking out at this point. And after a lot of thinking, encouragement, and a LOT LOT LOT of prayer, I decided I was going to do this thing. I was not sure how, but I was going to do it. 

I remember my mother saying "you will get through this, you it may be a complete blur, but you'll do it'. And she was right, I blinked, and it was over.  And its also true what they say about motherhood - the days are long but the weeks are short. That was true about school too. 

This part of my life was the hardest to move on from. This home bore witness to the best time in our lives and marriage and some of the hardest. It is not easy to be a new parent, and it is not easy to be a new parent and both go to school full time. It's not easy to be a parent and to be sitting IN a classroom 20 hours a week (i calculated it once- physically sitting in a seat yes- 20 hours) not including homework and other things. Its not easy to be a parent, a full time student, and to work 3 additional jobs. Yeah I'm really not sure how my darling husband did it. I know that there was a lot of Spark involved, that's for sure. 

Another story yet, is the massive post-partum depression that I experienced for months after having Henry, and the subsequent hormonal imbalance that I experienced and continue to experience even now. That may have been the most difficult piece to the whole story. But as I said, that's another story for another time. 

This home was perfect for us. It ended up physically being way too small for us by the end of it, but it was the most wonderful home. It was on these amazing tree-lined streets, and it held so many memories. I made some of my dearest friends that I will have for the rest of my life while living in that home, and had some awesome parties (the important part, no?).

I got to know the people who worked in the community around us, I knew everyone who worked in the local Starbucks just up the street, and they would have my drink waiting for me when they saw me walk in. They came to adore Henry and always had treats for him.

Robert interned at a local gym right down the street and Henry and I would walk down to visit the owners and their daughter who was just a bit younger than H. 

And finally, the women who cared for Henry the first year of his life were truly angels on earth. Saying goodbye to them was one of the hardest things to do. To find people who love your child even as half as much as you do (mamas you know that's a lot) then that is something truly special.  

I remember pulling away from that empty home in my tiny little car packed to the rim with things, a dog, and Henry and I, and weeping. 



6 comments:

  1. Change is always hard epically when it means leaving dear friends. Cherish the good memories and remember there are many more to come. Life is a journey not a distinatation.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Beautiful words and heart and that house is stinking adorable!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. You are so sweet! Thank you :) Also, I visited your blog and your family is the cutest!

      Delete
  3. I heard a quote last week that sums up what I have found "You are never truly at home once you move and leave people you love." For all the aggravation I find on social media, I am forever grateful that it eases the pain of distance.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Yes! So true. Your home is in little pieces around the country/world with all the people you love.

    ReplyDelete

 
SITE DESIGN BY DESIGNER BLOGS