Hearing Heart Blog

Last night I grabbed two hand-fulls of dried beans to throw into the pot for soaking, and even then I thought it might be too much. I'm having a hard time adjusting to just cooking for two! The chili turned out great and I still got a pile of typing done today. Gathered the eggs, fed the dog (twice), folded some laundry, checked on the goats, helped Amy move boxes to her new place, kissed my grandsons and daughter-in-law, picked up a packet at the post office, pumped weights, rode my bike, and typed typed typed typed. Also, spoke spoke spoke edited spoke edited spoke (voice recognition software). 43 more days now. We talked about the timing of Amy's leaving with this season of job change for us. It really is a process of change. It will be quite abrupt when it gets down to him walking out the door of his office for the last time. And his alarm clock doesn't go off the next morning. And he takes a deep breath and begins to r.e.l.a.x. ,',',',',',&

I helped my youngest child load boxes into our two cars tonight. She is moving out tomorrow, and she's been buzzingly busy. For some reason she cannot stop grinning. We sit and chat late into the night - me at my computer, and she sharing her dreams while draped over my old chair. In just days our lives will change forever. How incredible! In 44 days Jerry will have his turn. In fact, it feels like we are stepping out already. Every day now we talk about it and reinforce our desire and commitment to follow through. Since I began saving my paychecks we have felt far more free to dream about good work for him, as well. There are good things coming; we can feel it! My "book of the week" is a biography about Laura Ingalls Wilder, and all through it I see parallels with our lives right now. We are not the only ones who have turned the box of our lives over and dumped out the contents. Time to reexamine our stuff. Clean out the unnecessary. Break up the unusable and

The hardest thing today was telling my parents about our plans for Jerry's unemployment. They survived World War 2 and the Great Depression. How do you just walk away from a good job? We sat in our living room tonight with a bowl of (Oregon Hazelnut, Dad's favorite flavor) ice cream. I put some homemade cookies in a take-home baggy (that always pleases him) on his lap, and Jerry and I took turns attempting to explain our thoughts and plans for the future. 1. We just know it is the right step and the right time. 2. We don't know exactly what follows that. 3. We know that Jerry will have work that he will enjoy. 4. God is faithful, and we will do our best to follow him. 5. Like the poor tailor promised in Fiddler On the Roof, to his future father-in-law, in effect, "your daughter will not starve." 6. It may be a leap into the unknown, but here we go! #~#~#~#~#~#~#~#~#~#~#~

Jerry gave notice at work last week. 46 days from now he will walk away, unless something happens to release him sooner. It's funny, but we keep looking over our shoulder expecting to hear disparaging remarks about our choice to leave his job, but we haven't. We actually have only heard encouragement! How sweet is that! After the Easter service we heard that different ones had noticed a lightness to his step, a lifting of a burden from his shoulders. We hadn't expected it to be noticeable. We look at each other now with that wide-eyed wonder at the path we are on together, very near the same wonder that we saw in each others' eyes when we decided to marry. And when we were expecting our first child. And the first time I called him a grandpa. Wow. *-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-