A Year Later

It is that time again. Moving time. After a year in what I now lovingly refer to as “my neighborhood”, I am moving a few miles to the south for at least the next 6 months. I love adventure, new things, new experiences, meeting new people and learning about new culture. But I also love things that I call mine. My neighbor kids. My No Frills. My Panera’s where I go to use the internet and my waiter with the dreads who flirts with me every time I am there. My running routes. My big tree in my front yard. My parking spot. My commute to work. My cashiers at the store. My QT where I get hot chocolate more often than I should. My beautiful houses in my neighborhood. My streets I bike on to run errands. My library and my post office with my favorite clerk named Zig. My Saint Cecelia’s. My eye level view of the world out my basement window.  And now I am leaving all those things I love for an adventure. Someone tried to comfort me by reminding me I could find new running trails, new grocery stores, new waiters to flirt with me. And I will. But this place will always have something special in my heart. After all, the year I have spent here has been a very full one. One year ago exactly I started working at Compass. My heart has grown so entwined with my Compass kids I don’t remember my life before I loved them. In one year I went from not knowing anything to teaching by myself, leading on days when my boss is out of town or sick, taking the kids on field trips with me in charge, and even a whole 8 hour van ride in charge of the kids. Let’s not remember that one actually. Nine months ago today I started dating the most amazing man in the world who makes me happier than I thought was possible and still keeps me on my toes as well. 

This year has been one of many adventures. I have been inside a pipe organ, on a sailboat, on the back and front of a motorcycle, 60 miles on the back of a tandem, across the finish line of a half marathon, on the top of 3 mountains in 3 days, on a zip-line, to Iowa, Missouri, Arkansas, Illinois, Wisconsin, Minnesota, and Colorado, able to read more books than I have in the last 3 years combined, everywhere within 10 miles on my single-speed, on the stage with someone I was extremely proud of as they graduated high school, under barbed wire through a mud pit, to the World Series for the first time ever, to the cancer center, called Meme by the most adorable 2-year-old ever, to a Brad Paisley concert, and not home to the farm often enough.  This year has been one of tears as all years are, but also one of more healing and laughter than I ever expected. With a year like that in this place, I feel I am leaving a little part of me behind in #14. But not so much of me that I am not ready to start it all over again in 1439 ½. 

I am moving to a different part of Omaha, one infamous for its Hispanic population. I have jokingly said many times that I am moving from the hood to Mexico. But I had two choices. When it came time to find a new place two places came up. One was here in my neighborhood, less than half a mile from my apartment now. It was in a really nice house where I could still go to my No Frills, my running trails, and I wouldn’t get lost trying to find everything because I already knew where everything is here. The other one is the place I am moving to. On the other side of town, in a totally different culture, where I got so lost the first time I went to look at it, it took me half an hour to drive like 2 miles back. It is a new adventure. With new neighbor kids to meet and love, new cashiers to talk to, a new library, new beautiful buildings to look at on my skyline. It is going to be a busy week or two while I get packed up, moved, Hillary married off, settled in, and figure out how long it takes me to get to work. But in the meantime, feel free to leave a comment and get ready to hear about the next chapter in the beautiful things God is doing in my life.