What Happened

It's been a month now since I was here - children napping, typing away on the computer, juggling a game or two of scrabbulous between paragraphs - and then the phone rang, it was my husband, but he only gave me three words. Three words before hanging up, before I was on the floor, on my knees. Pray for me.

I prayed until I was reduced to repeating myself over and over like a skipping record. I paced around the house. I peeked in on my children. I called my mother. We prayed. She began pacing. The Boss began stirring and so I hung up the phone and smoothed my nerves and went to hug him and ask him what he'd like for lunch. Crustless sandwich? Ravioli? Something normal. Something to suggest that this was an ordinary day. That his father always calls to ask for prayer and then hangs up.

And so we left the bedroom together, The Boss and I, and walked into the kitchen and there was my husband in the living room. At lunchtime on a Monday. My husband with red-rimmed eyes and a look of disbelief. My husband, fired.

It's strange, how life can spin you around like that, shaking loose everything you'd held onto as secure. Strange how life can decide it's time for a change long before you're ready. Not that there's ever a time when a young family is prepared to have their provider stop, um, providing.

So, this past month I've had to accept that my part-time job(s) are now "official" jobs. That although neither of the jobs I have do anything more than pay (a few of the many) bills. Neither are things I would put on my resume. Neither are steps in my "career" - yet I'm trapped. Forty hours a week spent doing jobs that high school kids do during the summer, working for fresh-out-of-college supervisor's who are six years my junior.

Don't misread me. I am grateful that we already had something in place when this happened. That I only needed to up my hours, not find a job altogether. I'm grateful that my bosses do pay me better than the average employee. And I'm especially grateful that this whirlwind of stress didn't touch ground until after I finished grad school. For all of these things I am grateful. And for the work that I trust God is doing in all of this situation, I am grateful. I'm thanking him in advance for how He is going to use this as a force of good in my husband's life and career.

But yes, I'm stressed and tired and snippy and miserable whenever I have to leave my kids. And after only a few weeks of this, I can safely say that I'll be more than ready to relinquish the title of breadwinner to my husband whenever he is able to assume it.