Incognito
Fortunately for me, I don't think anyone other than close friends or family read this blog. So, probably no one really noticed that I went missing for a month. My close friends and family probably knew the main reasons why. If anyone else happens to be reading this blog, I'll fill you in, we just moved our whole family from Kentucky to North Carolina. This may not seem like a big move to some people, but we had lived in our current town for over 7 years, building friendships and church family and community. It has been a really hard month making those separations and preparing to put our house on the market.
I've officially been in North Carolina a week tomorrow, and I can already feel the effects of the lack of community. Compounding this sudden move is the fact that one of my children has gotten very sick this week. It started with a cough on moving day (last Saturday), which I didn't worry too much about, and then Sunday night developed into a mild fever, which again I didn't worry about, then Monday and Tuesday were high fever days where he mostly sat around feeling miserable and napped off and on. There were lots of requests for "someone to snuggle with" and obviously we were limited to the house since he had such a high fever.
Of course, when you're away from your community, you don't have someone to ask about which doctors offices might be open late on a Tuesday night for your child whose fever suddenly spikes to 104, So you panic and fret, and eventually wind up going to the Target clinic closest to you where there's a 1.5 hour wait and by the time he waits that long his fever is gone. Isn't that always the case, that as soon as you go to the doctor, they get over whatever they had?
But now the baby is grumpy and coughing, no fever yet, but I feel like I'm sitting around waiting for the next bomb to drop. If he gets sick, then I'm looking at another 5-7 days before I can finally get started trying to put community together in this new place.
So, for now, it feels like I'm living an incognito life. Struggling through the days as best I can. My bad attitude towards my kids has no neighbor or friend to tell me I'm wrong, and despite being closer to family (my in-laws) I still feel far away from the friends and neighbors I've left behind. I wonder how many others are living incognito right now? How many of my neighbors in this apartment complex for our temporary housing, how many students at low-performing schools, how many single moms or dads with no one to help them out when things go wrong, how many rich homeowners in their gated communities who don't even see their own neighbors?
Maybe if we all put just a little more of ourselves out there, when we have the time, chance or opportunity, we could live a little bit more life together.
I've officially been in North Carolina a week tomorrow, and I can already feel the effects of the lack of community. Compounding this sudden move is the fact that one of my children has gotten very sick this week. It started with a cough on moving day (last Saturday), which I didn't worry too much about, and then Sunday night developed into a mild fever, which again I didn't worry about, then Monday and Tuesday were high fever days where he mostly sat around feeling miserable and napped off and on. There were lots of requests for "someone to snuggle with" and obviously we were limited to the house since he had such a high fever.
Of course, when you're away from your community, you don't have someone to ask about which doctors offices might be open late on a Tuesday night for your child whose fever suddenly spikes to 104, So you panic and fret, and eventually wind up going to the Target clinic closest to you where there's a 1.5 hour wait and by the time he waits that long his fever is gone. Isn't that always the case, that as soon as you go to the doctor, they get over whatever they had?
But now the baby is grumpy and coughing, no fever yet, but I feel like I'm sitting around waiting for the next bomb to drop. If he gets sick, then I'm looking at another 5-7 days before I can finally get started trying to put community together in this new place.
So, for now, it feels like I'm living an incognito life. Struggling through the days as best I can. My bad attitude towards my kids has no neighbor or friend to tell me I'm wrong, and despite being closer to family (my in-laws) I still feel far away from the friends and neighbors I've left behind. I wonder how many others are living incognito right now? How many of my neighbors in this apartment complex for our temporary housing, how many students at low-performing schools, how many single moms or dads with no one to help them out when things go wrong, how many rich homeowners in their gated communities who don't even see their own neighbors?
Maybe if we all put just a little more of ourselves out there, when we have the time, chance or opportunity, we could live a little bit more life together.
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