Moving Forward

I put off writing today because I didn't want to write about Covid-19 or distance learning or stress or . . . well, you get the idea. Yet, what else was there to write about? Those are the things consuming my attention these days.

All day long, as I sat in my new classroom, aka my dining room, I stole glances out the window. After days of clouds and rain, the sky was once again blue, a complementary backdrop to the newly green leaves and the lingering white and pink blossoms. The bright sunshine beckoned. However, being the responsible (or possibly obsessive-compulsive) teacher I am, I remained glued to my computer screen.

This afternoon, though, I finally broke free from my computer and, answering the call of this gorgeous spring day, I slipped outside. I turned my face up to the sky. The sun felt warm and comforting as a slight breeze blew strands of hair away from my face. I listened to the gurgling of water washing down over rocks in the waterfall as I breathed in deeply, slowly. 

Everything seemed so normal.

I looked around the yard and began to picture what it would look like when we finally completed all the projects we have planned. My goal was to transform the current wasteland into an oasis by summer. As I began to review my mental to-do list needed to accomplish my goal, I felt something I haven't felt in days. I wasn't entirely sure what the emotion was. Excitement? Hope?

With this rediscovered, although unnamed, feeling bubbling inside of me, it occurred to me that, even though it may feel like it right now, these strange times we're living in are not going to last forever. It's temporary, just like every time that's come before. We have a tendency to think that the way things are right now are never going to change. But of course they do. Life is always moving, always changing. Seasons come and seasons go. Change is sometimes mourned, sometimes welcomed. No matter how it is received, however, change is the one thing we can count on. There is, I believe, some comfort to be found in that.

We'll get through this. Eventually. Will things ever be exactly the same as they were before? No, of course not.

But they were never going to be exactly the same anyway.