Finding Rest After and On the Edge of Chaos
My feet still hurt over a week past our move-in date- 54,925 steps over 4 days will do that to you, I guess. The push to get out of our old house and fully into our new home was marked by incredible "just in time" help from a small army of friends and acquaintances which we can never fully appreciate enough and which we could never fully repay. After what has felt like a long and grueling journey, we have arrived in our new home 8 weeks prior to our son's anticipated arrival.
WARNING: Nerd Moment Ahead...
So, not unlike Frodo's journey, we find ourselves safely escaped from The Shire (naive, pre-diagnosis), past Bree, the Wilderness, and just beyond Weathertop into the restful haven of Rivendell to recuperate from the initial stages of our journey. In total, it was just over 13 weeks since the day we learned our son has HLHS until the day we moved into our home- 92 days of planning, preparation, and non-stop action that culminated in Logan getting the Flu and unexpected help arriving just in time to save the day (Thanks Glorfindel! i.e.: everyone who showed up at the last hour to see us safely home). To be fair to Frodo, his journey was approximately 100 days longer than ours and so he must have appreciated the security of Rivendell just a bit more than we do now, but I am certain he had a similar time getting used to the idea of resting.
I imagine Frodo to have been quite conflicted during his time in Rivendell. On the one hand, he was recovering from a wound- surely beyond the point of exhaustion and ready to sit a while in the peaceful halls of Imladris- maybe indefinitely. On the other, he still carried the Ring and I think he knew in his heart Rivendell was a stop-over, not a final destination. As book readers/movie watchers, we know Frodo's journey after Imladris would be much longer and under far more dire circumstances than the journey it took to get him there in the first place. Much the same, I know our family has far more trying times ahead than what has come before and so our time in Rivendell is complicated. The battles so far are won, but the war is still a looming shadow, dark on the horizon.
<End Nerd Moment>
What does that all mean, analogy aside? For one, we know we need to rest. Thankfully, both a physical place and temporal space has been given us to do so. The trick right now is remembering how. With over 3 months of non-stop activity, both mental and physical, how do we pump the breaks and truly and languorously recover? How do we accomplish this all the while knowing the peace we have now is for a short season and that we will be going back into the wilderness and into darker and more difficult days than the ones which have come before? It is a daunting task, but we must do our level best to try. This time is a both a known quantity and a true gift. To squander it worrying and fearful of the day it's over would be worse than not having the rest at all.
The best way I can see to truly soak in the peace is to actively appreciate and enjoy our last two months as parents to just one child. Eliza journeys alongside us, but without any presentiment of her future. The innocence of her ignorance should be cherished and nurtured and so with the change of the weather from Winter to Spring, I see us out in the yard playing, on the Eno splashing, and just generally soaking up the sweet time we have in our Rivendell, loving on our little girl and each other as best we know how.
WARNING: Nerd Moment Ahead...
So, not unlike Frodo's journey, we find ourselves safely escaped from The Shire (naive, pre-diagnosis), past Bree, the Wilderness, and just beyond Weathertop into the restful haven of Rivendell to recuperate from the initial stages of our journey. In total, it was just over 13 weeks since the day we learned our son has HLHS until the day we moved into our home- 92 days of planning, preparation, and non-stop action that culminated in Logan getting the Flu and unexpected help arriving just in time to save the day (Thanks Glorfindel! i.e.: everyone who showed up at the last hour to see us safely home). To be fair to Frodo, his journey was approximately 100 days longer than ours and so he must have appreciated the security of Rivendell just a bit more than we do now, but I am certain he had a similar time getting used to the idea of resting.
I imagine Frodo to have been quite conflicted during his time in Rivendell. On the one hand, he was recovering from a wound- surely beyond the point of exhaustion and ready to sit a while in the peaceful halls of Imladris- maybe indefinitely. On the other, he still carried the Ring and I think he knew in his heart Rivendell was a stop-over, not a final destination. As book readers/movie watchers, we know Frodo's journey after Imladris would be much longer and under far more dire circumstances than the journey it took to get him there in the first place. Much the same, I know our family has far more trying times ahead than what has come before and so our time in Rivendell is complicated. The battles so far are won, but the war is still a looming shadow, dark on the horizon.
<End Nerd Moment>
What does that all mean, analogy aside? For one, we know we need to rest. Thankfully, both a physical place and temporal space has been given us to do so. The trick right now is remembering how. With over 3 months of non-stop activity, both mental and physical, how do we pump the breaks and truly and languorously recover? How do we accomplish this all the while knowing the peace we have now is for a short season and that we will be going back into the wilderness and into darker and more difficult days than the ones which have come before? It is a daunting task, but we must do our level best to try. This time is a both a known quantity and a true gift. To squander it worrying and fearful of the day it's over would be worse than not having the rest at all.
The best way I can see to truly soak in the peace is to actively appreciate and enjoy our last two months as parents to just one child. Eliza journeys alongside us, but without any presentiment of her future. The innocence of her ignorance should be cherished and nurtured and so with the change of the weather from Winter to Spring, I see us out in the yard playing, on the Eno splashing, and just generally soaking up the sweet time we have in our Rivendell, loving on our little girl and each other as best we know how.
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