well, we made it! i’m officially a hoosier and feeling a bit of regret tonight about not enjoying florida quite as much as a could have. i know there are a select few florida lovers who are dying to say ‘i told you so’, but i’m not necessarily referring to missing the beach and warm weather. when we moved to lakeland from ft myers, grant and i started our lives together. we got married 7 months after moving to lakeland, but the second i moved there, i just knew i didn’t want to live there long term. five years later… we actually moved. had i know when we moved to lakeland that we’d be hunkering down for more than a year or two, i would have done a lot of things different.
keeping people at arm’s length wasn’t really my intention and i certainly didn’t realize i was doing it. about 2 years after living in lakeland and keeping people at a ‘safe’ distance, i realized that we wouldn’t be moving quite as quickly as i had once thought. about that time, i decided that i should maybe be a little more open and let some people into my life. bad news was… it was just simply too late. now, i had a few close girlfriends here and there, but not really the support group one needs after 2 years. so, after keeping people closed out and then realizing far too late that i needed those exact people that i shut out, i had a few miserable years. i hadn’t lost all joy and i have a great husband, but moving from ft myers where i have dependable, irreplaceable girlfriends, i knew i needed that no matter where i’m living. phone conversations with those girlfriends certainly helped a little, but everyone needs a support system on a daily basis.
reflecting on my poor choices in the past and really carefree mistakes, i knew moving to lafayette had to be different. it’s going to be uncomfortable to push myself out of my comfort zone and meet new people, but this time… i know we’re not moving. we’re planning to settle here and there’s no point in keeping closed off to myself! besides me needing women in my life that i can confide in and that will challenge me, they need me too. and that’s one of the hardest pill of this process to swallow. although i don’t feel that i’m moving forward in my personal challenges as much as i once was, there are women that i will meet and get to know who need my testimony, my encouragement and my sense of humor.
i’m believing for a really smooth transition and i know that 100% of that is riding on my shoulders. if you think of it, pray that god will put particular people in my life for this season and for seasons to come. and that he’ll place me in the lives of others. cause, really, at the end of the day, it truly is all about people. people are why we exist.
