wanting change

The deployment brought into the open a lot of character flaws that I'd previously been unaware of. I wrestled with them through that year. Kim's coming home helped me to stifle them, a little. But these partially hidden flaws still affect me, like rocks just beneath the river's surface.

This last week has been . . . significant. Spiritual. There's a crossroads before me, I can sense it, feel it. There's a quiet sort of energy thrumming underneath, an anticipatory sort of excitement rising. I've been here before. A few months ago, I was too uncertain to act.

If I make the right choice here, I can break free of these things I hate about myself. I know it.

But if I hesitate . . . if I wait . . . Not choosing is in itself a choice, as I learned last time.

First I must start making time for myself each night. A time without mommyhood interruptions or technological distractions. A time to just be me as I think, journal, and pray.

This, I can do. And through this, everything else will come.

growing

Usually it's only when I notice how big my kids are getting that I remember how old I am getting.  I forget that I am not still a teenager (though admittedly, I'm not so far away from those years).  But then a situation like tonight's will occur, when I find myself hanging out with people who have been friends so long that the lines between families have blended.  I still find myself sitting and listening to the adults talk, but then I get the odd realization that I am now counted among them - almost like, since I have become a mother, I have grown up enough to be 'worthy' of entering the conversation.

It's most clear to me when these people, who I grew up calling my aunt and uncle, now label themselves as such for my children . . . when did our friendship change from peer to child, into peer to peer?  I wasn't paying attention.  I didn't think that there was anything to be paying attention to!  But now it's over and done with, and I'm all mixed up about it.

On the one hand, I am excited that I've finally 'achieved' adult status.  On the other, I am nervous of the added responsibility, as well as the change.

music

I've been rediscovering the joys of music.  I had forgotten it for about 4 years.  I was still fond of it during that time, but the joy was lost when my first pregnancy changed my voice.  Before being pregnant, I was a soprano, but ever since 2006, I have been unable to reach most of those notes.  At first I was too discouraged to even bother trying to sing differently.  Later I began to experiment with lower notes, but aside from becoming a little better at harmonizing (sometimes, my husband now says, my harmonization kicks . . . butt), I found that it was unhelpful.  I can't reach most of the alto notes, either - at least not without feeling like my voice is dragging on the ground.  I am now something between alto and soprano, whatever that is.  My choir days are most likely over, unless they come up with a new grouping of singers.

I couldn't sing along to my favorite songs, and I couldn't sing while playing guitar.  So I stopped listening to and creating music.  It was far too difficult to constantly be reminded of the fact that I could no longer do something that I love.  I stopped trying to overcome it.

But something has changed over this year.  I think I just finally got used to how my voice works now.  I've been slowly learning a new style of singing that fits my neither-here-nor-there range.  It's still very challenging to sing along with other people . . . the soprano who has not been fully eradicated from my mind continues to try to follow or sing above others, depending on their range.  But now that I'm singing more at home, I think that won't be as big of an issue anymore; I'll be able to silence that soprano part of me with familiarity in a new voice and style of singing.

It has been interesting to note how much my singing ability has improved since the change.  And I can sing along with my guitar playing with much greater ease now!  Even though the change was really painful and it felt that I had completely lost something dear to me, I would go through it again.