Pause

I just. Need. A moment. A moment to gather all of my thoughts, emotions, feelings and process them all... To categorize things as good or bad or indifferent, to be inside of my own head. Right now, everything is a jumbled mess, and I have been on edge since we got to Augusta less than 24 hours ago and moved into my parents home, I spent my high school years here, but this is a new house. It's still very foreign and just establishing itself as a home for me.

We hit the ground running. Drove 8 hours in separate cars, my husband driving Vanity (our van) with the stuff Nia and I need for the next few months and both children riding with me in Carmen (our car). From then we immediately turned our focus to  the search for our first home, so much that the reality of even being here hasn't sunk in for me. In a little over 24 hours I will be returning to full-time work. How do I even feel about that? I've spent the past 3 months at home with my children and I've gotten to know them so much better. Who would want to leave that? Not necessarily me. People (other women) seem to feel like I should have been restless and bored by now, but that wasn't the case. My only complaint was that it meant we were living off savings.. And I wish I had befriended other stay at home moms so I felt like part of a community. By the beginning of 2012, all sense of community for us in Virginia had (quite literally) moved away. We never managed to get it back. I am excited to have a fresh start in a revisited place.

There will still remain the need to put ourselves out here and build community here, but at least my parents and family friends (family) are here. That warms my heart. Also, most of my close friends and one of my sisters are all just two hours away in Atlanta. Sometimes I wish all my loved ones would just move within a 4-hour radius of wherever we are! That's selfish I know, but I've always placed value in being near them. I used to spend my breaks in college visiting family that was within driving distance, which had me all over the southeastern part of the country.

It makes me sad that while moving to GA places me with my parents, we are much farther from my family in New Jersey. I hope we can figure out how to see each other. It's been nearly 4 years since I saw my older-younger sister and my parents in New Orleans because we couldn't afford to get down there. I've already started trying to figure out when we can get down there in the next few months. I miss them so much.

Switching gears, I am definitely anxious about getting back to work, the working mother grind really. Staying home with the children, I was able to do a lot more for them. I had the energy to be with them... at least most of the time. I hope I can keep it up. I don't plan to work any less hard. in fact, I plan to work even harder this time around. Hopefully the family-friendly hours will make the balancing act less difficult. 

I guess I'm excited. Yeah...I'm excited...and we might be buying a house soon too.