Countdowns.

When you start a countdown or a pie chart or fill in your calendar for the grand total of 487 days or 70 weeks, or 16 months or 1 year and 4 months or whatever, you make it your business to tick off the days.  And I did.  To the chagrin of most of my nursing school classmates.  It was, in it's own way, a life vest for me.  My obsessive counting gave me a way to feel like I was actually accomplishing something, especially on the days I was just so very thankful to have survived. Sometimes making it through the day WAS the accomplishment. But now that 108 days have passed since my pinning day, I cannot believe that it went by so fast! I graduated on May 3rd.  By June 10th I started my first job.  Now I am having to count BACKWARD to keep track of where the time has gone!  Eight years of study, prayer, work, prayer, crying, complaining and more study (with lots of parenting, wifing and familying mixed in there) the final goal has been accomplished. Wearing a big fat RN badge feels pretty darn amazing. There is still so much new. Going to school to earn your RN is very different than actually being one.  In fact, there are days when I wonder just exactly what I DO know. It's good, satisfying work.  My heart still leaps, even in the middle of a terrible shift, at the fact that God has granted me this amazing gift.  I hope that never stops.

What's my next countdown? 47 days until my first medical mission trip to the jungle of Honduras to work alongside my dear friend Erin in Clinica El Arbol de la Vida.

It's a good year.


P.s.
On the day of my graduation an extraordinary thing happened (as if the day itself wasn't extraordinary enough). While I stood at the podium waiting for my turn to be pinned I stared across the stage at the man without whom I could never have survived RN school (my husband, in case anyone was actually curious who that man may be). Suddenly I heard my nickname shouted from the audience.  Not just any nickname.  One that belongs only to me given by only one person.  While I turned to find the face that matched the voice, a switch took place. As I waved to Dannielane in the audience, blown away that my dear friend flew from Washington to be at my graduation, I turned around to see that my very best girlfriend was standing where my husband had been.  All the way from Honduras!!  She actually got to pin me!  It was, as they say, a dream come true.  God is so generous.  The days that followed were filled with celebrations, family and friends.  The four amigas (Erin, Dannie, Sonia and I) got to spend quality time together doing crazy girlie stuff and just cramming in as much talk/tears/laughter as we could manage in the days allotted.

See what I mean? Extraordinary.

 

Just a little update...

Only 81 days left.  Total.  That includes weekends and holidays between now and May 3rd.  I can do almost ANYTHING for 12 more weeks.  Except go without peanut butter. I am always thankful when I leave the hospital for the week and haven't experienced anything that makes peanut butter unattractive to me.   But I digress.  

We are busy.  All 5 of us.  It doesn't seem so crazy until we have a moment to breathe and are standing there like "What just happened??" A constant stream of school, work, study, repeat.  Not that I am complaining.  Just like anything, you put one foot in front of the other and git-er-done! But it catches up every now and again.  

This week brought big change in a blink of an eye.  Let me just say that God answered deep, longing prayers  for my family.  He brought home that which was lost and restored a sense of whole again.  The best parts are the ones that took place behind the scenes.  I've said before that it shouldn't be a big fat surprise when God does grand things.  He is after all, God. While praying for the return of that which was lost, I asked that God would place Christians all around and in the way.  In my mind that looked like the obvious things...friends, co-workers, church members.  But that is not at all how it happened.  It was through a stranger that took a shine to the lost one and prayed. I never would have known about this except that the story was shared with me today because their paths crossed while each was on an errand of their own. The two talked and shared current news.  The stranger said that she had been praying every day for some time.  She had been speaking into the life of that which was lost for months and it culminated today in a prayer, right there at the bank, at a time of need.  I love my family so much, every single one.  I am fiercely protective.  To a fault.  When you wrong them, I have to pray REALLY hard for grace.  But when you love on them, especially in a way that matters for eternity, you have won a place in my heart.  For this stranger, I thank my creative, loving and faithful God.  May He bless her socks off and may he raise up others like her to pray for her in whatever way she may need.  And may it start with me.