Uncertainty

If somebody had told my past self that I'd be living with my parents at forty-two and navigating a divorce during the worst pandemic in a century while wrangling the emotions and needs of three very intense pre-teen kids -- I would have laughed in their face. Or run.

I have a hard time dealing with uncertainty. Maybe it's my personality; maybe it's my brain's neurological wiring, I don't know. I'm a person who always needs a plan, goals to work toward every day and in life in general. Now, those goals are as fleeting and unpredictable as the reflections from shiny objects in the sun. Without a plan, I feel like I'm losing it. What do I do with this?

Two months before Californians were ordered to shelter in place for a "few weeks," I had finally landed a great job as a bookkeeper at a local accounting firm. A huge relief, given the amount of time my mind and body had needed to decompress after leaving an emotionally draining marriage. It was time to pull myself up by my britches and start working on that freedom I had been craving for so long. I was ready to climb out of my miserable rut.

I don't think that anyone had expected things to change so much, and it's clear that many are still in the denial stage of their grief. Our world is different, and we are all suddenly finding ourselves forced to let go and adapt, whether we like it or not.

My job as a bookkeeper should have been easy enough to continue doing from home. Except. I'm terrible at working from home. Add kids to the mix, homeschooling, an ailing father. All I can say is that those single parents out there who can work from home, or anywhere, and still manage to be rock stars at everything they do are heroes. I'm certainly not a hero. But I am here. And my kids need me to be here most of all. Thankfully, my employers are incredibly understanding and are leaving the door open to return to the office when it's safe to do so.

So what next?

I still need to work. I need to work in a way that somehow benefits my home and family, where I can give them all the care and attention they need, and that doesn't require me to focus quietly in uninterrupted solitude. I was a stay-at-home mom for roughly twelve years after my second child's birth had made daycare a poor investment. All I have now are the things that carried me through those years at home while I raised my babies. A collection of hobbies of old crafts, or as some people like to call them, "zombie apocalypse skills." Appropriate for these times, I'd say. Where I live is where my mother and I were both raised. It's a big chunk of property by California suburban standards, and like family, it needs care.

This Woven Life is my venture into blogging about a bunch of stuff I know how to do well and a bunch of stuff I'm just now learning. Fortunately, I love to learn, and I love to share.

It's time to dig in.