Retirement

How many people do you know who were retired for six months before they realized it? Maybe someone with a serious head injury, or some unfortunate recipient of a seriously twisted practical joke, or some misguided soul who stopped taking their pills. But no. I am here to tell you that after six months of trying to figure out this strange new stage of my life, I finally realized that it's called retirement. Yes! And when the realization hit home I nearly did a happy dance! Mothering is a job that never ends, in one capacity or another, so there is no retirement from that blessed career; but Education Management Specialist is a title I am only too glad to have relinquished. Since September of 1978 I have immersed myself body, soul and spirit in that career, and in June 2009 it came to an end, like a whisper.

This was a career I had never planned for nor prepared for, but it was the path I found myself on as I took one step at a time following the illumination provided by the lamp of God's Word. Step. Looks good. Step. Wait, where am I? Step. Whoa! What am I doing here? Step. Deep breaths needed because we're too far in to turn back now. Step. This is awesome! Step. I hate this! Step. God is teaching me many new and wonderful things. Step. Where is God in this mess? Step. I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me. Step. Did God get me confused with someone else when He started me on this path? Step. This is very rewarding and satisfying. Step. I am losing my mind. Step. Do not grow weary in well-doing. Step. Do not grow weary in well-doing. Step. Do not grow weary in well-doing. Step. How many people shall we invite to the graduation party?

And suddenly it was over. Thirty-one years of stepping along the Education Management Specialist path. Choosing a private Christian school and managing the transportation, homework, chicken pox, fundraisers, and social crises. Keeping a child home and refusing to send her back to school where she was chronically sick and unhappy, risking the consequences of a visit from Child Protective Services. Jail for Daddy? Having our child taken from us? It mattered not. When the light from God's Word shined on the path, that is where I stepped. Homeschooling! That's where the path was taking us all along, in 1985 in New York State. And, oh, the work, and fun, and exhaustion, and exhilaration, and discouragement, and gratification, and stretching, and tears that lay along that path. But every path has twists and turns, and before I knew it we were taking a fork that was called private Christian school again. My rebellious heart fought against it even as I continued taking the steps in faith. Valedictorian for one, and special ed for another. What was God thinking when He put this family together? But nothing along that career path was ever more worth celebrating than the final leg of the journey, when the last of the litter had the clarity of mind and vision to request help in completing the course. And while we all experienced a severe jostling through those last two years, causing us to hang on for all we were worth to God's grace, we reached the end and the diploma sealed the deal.

So now here I am, officially retired from teaching and transporting and juggling school calendars and providing endless pep talks. I keep thinking about what that means, and all the options that gives God with my time, and I keep stepping. Step. Step. Step. Never a dull day when God's Word is a lamp for my feet and a light for my path.