Change is the essence

There are times memories are extremely painful.

The friends I had growing up have more or less moved on with their lives. The things we did together I treasured so much are no longer possible.

I am aging rapidly and painfully...it is no longer possible for me to run and jump, play basketball or baseball or golf for hours on end. Even if I could, there is nobody left to do them with.

My friends have moved on, gotten jobs, families, many of them kids. Some I still do stuff with on occasion, with others there is little or no contact.

I have advanced some of my own dreams. I am close...painfully close...to completing my history degree. I have spent this past week with my wife celebrating her graduating with honors from accelerated nursing school.

She is looking for a job, and as reality sets in ever more firmly, it is more and more obvious that job will likely mean additional time apart.

On the one hand, this has been a very wonderful week we have spent together. On the other hand, with just a handful of hours left before we are again separated for an indeterminate length of time, it is heart-breaking.

As we mentioned in conversation when pondering various possible outcomes, we may not LIKE being apart, but we are getting used to it.

Just as I do not LIKE having grown apart from my closest friends...but I have gotten USED to it.

A very scary concept.

Yes, in the back of my mind are those fears that her achieving her dream of nursing will come at the cost of us together. Or of me moving away from all that is familiar. Or of...well, there are so many potential outcomes, and it is impossible to see which one will occur.

With that uncertainty comes fear, worry...there are certain prices I am unwilling to pay, but I may not have a choice in the matter.

No matter what happens, change, and of a major variety, is here.

It only remains to see what we make of it.

And how we deal with it.

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