Another bad day

We all have bad days, right? Of course right. But it seems especially unfair, spectacularly unfair, when that bad day falls on a Sabbath. It started with a long, sleepless night and just went downhill from there.

Judah had a meltdown at church resulting in J having to spend the entire service in the back of the church calming him down. This is the happy child we're talking about here. Judah is not the moody type. He rarely actually Cries. Whining we deal with-- it's a family besetting sin (well, not J, just the rest of us), but the crying? that's not like him. He wailed heartbreakingly when dropped off and after about five minutes, J just went in and got him.

I just know it's the move and the unsettled-ness getting to him. He was never like this at church back home. He spent the rest of the day being super clingy and wanting to sit on me, talking about our old house and his friends and asking for Violet to come see him. We got on Skype with the Other Forsheys and chatted for a while and he was so precious ooing and aaaahing over Grace-- whom he ADORED from the moment he first saw her, just a few moments after she was born. He told me that God told him He was going to give Violet "lotsalotsalotsa money to buy a aaaaeeerplane, so she can come see me in Flooooda"

And then all the trickiness I've been trying to balance with neighbor kids came to a bit of a head and I had to call Sofi in from playing Chicken (!!!!) in the pool with the neighbor boys (!!!) , riding on the shoulders of a neighborhood dad (!!!). And somehow I had to find a way to explain that Ladies don't play chicken in the pool with boys while riding on the shoulders of men we don't know. *sigh* Never an easy conversation to have with your 8 yo. And yes, we'd given her permission to play in the pool with the gang of kids and adults out there. It's right off our front porch after all, and one of the dads we know vaguely had offered to be responsible for her. Apparently our version of "responsible" and his version were... not the same.

We were supposed to have dinner with some new friends, but by 4:00 in the afternoon, after the conversation with Sofi, and a parental conference over Judah's anxiety issues, and a failed attempt at a nap (for me), and the gradually increasing stranglehold of a headcold (J), and Jamie's constant bone-crushing roller-coaster imitation (me) had all worked their magic, we decided that it might be just a bit much. So we didn't go. And not-going made us both feel a little lonely and a little more aware of just how soon (pleaseLordpleasemakeitsoonAmen) we'd being entering that fatigue-crazed labyrinth of new-baby-ness without the safety net of a settled church family.

And someone sang Be Thou My Vision at the offertory this morning and it was beautiful. And I cried. Still. I think I will never be able to hear that song again without thinking of that tiny wooden box and the room full of mourners trying so hard to find words to say, to express what their hearts were feeling. That one line:

Heart of my own heart, whatever befall....

It stabs me to the heart. To think that they choose to claim that, even in the midst of heart-crushing grief-- such faith awes me and touches me and I want so much to be there with her, for her. But I can't.

So, so much has changed so veryvery quickly for our family this year. I still feel as though I'm standing in one of those hourglasses with the sand running rapidly through, out from under my feet and I'm clinging to the slippery glass walls trying to find a way to keep from getting sucked through. I just haven't had the time and the space to process it all, to "adjust". Someone asked us this morning when we decided to move and J said the end of March and it hit me. Bam. March, April, May, June, July, August. Six months. Half a year. That's all. In six months we went from normal Us, to something that, on a Bad Day, I don't even recognize anymore.

I recognize that bad days come and go and there are also beautiful Florida days, when the kids are happy and Jamie is still and tranquil, the contractions are mild, J gets home early and I remember that "...the lines have fallen to me in pleasant places". I am so thankful for all that the Lord has worked in our lives in these six short months.

But some days, I just want some time to sit and think. And some days I just want to go out for coffee at Organic Grounds. Or drop in on the Trainums. Or run into friends at the Farmer's Market. Or call Laurie up and go buy some plants. Or put up a post on Facebook to meet me at the library in twenty minutes and see who shows up!

I think I should go to bed now and see if things look any better in the morning.