When you get what you want...

Sometimes we go around desiring something so bad we can hardly stand it. We know how we'd act, what life would be like, and how much we would enjoy it. And then sometimes, it happens and we don't know what to do with it.

For instance, yesterday afternoon, I found myself blissfully alone. The kids came home after school, went to a friend's house and David wasn't due back from a meeting until later that evening. I had several hours, my main work for the day was done...and I didn't know what to do. I fretted, visited the same web-sites over and over again, avoided reading my book, didn't want to watch tv, was bored with my computer game. In essense, I was alone and quiet--and I didn't like it.

Crazy.

I think one of the problems with yesterday was that I wasn't prepared to be alone. I'd completed all my work so that I could be available for the kids when they got home, but once I found out that they weren't goin to be home, I didn't have anything to occupy myself. This is something that David and I have discussed several times regarding our life after they graduate from high school. We spend an awful lot of time and energy parenting them, discussing them, hoping that things will work out ok, and once they're gone, what are we going to fill that time with?

It's something that we both want very badly...I don't want us to fret, be bored, or wonder what our lives were about. I want us to thrive, to be excited, to turn the page on the new chapter in our lives and say "wow...we've got something special here." I hope we can manage not to crumble over the next couple of years of stress, and to wake up on the other side, and be so tired and careworn that we don't bother to do what it takes to thrive. That would definitely be crazy.