Endings and Beginnings

I've felt the need to publish something, anything, for a while now. I guess when we reach periods of transition in our lives, when we are grieving in anticipation of the loss of our current selves and looking forward nervously to the unknown, we feel the need to memorialize somehow our current state of mind before it is gone forever.

I just graduated last week with a Master's degree from Westminster College, which qualifies me to sit for the certification exam which qualifies me for the license which qualifies me to get a new job. I have received two degrees before this one, but neither felt real to me. I'm not sure why. This one had a feeling of weight to it, as if responsibility were settling at last on my shoulders for who I will be professionally for the rest of my life. In conjunction with these recent events I have had feelings of panic, of gravitas, of pride, of camaraderie, of gratitude. I am a mix of emotions. As I looked at my reflection in the window of the Shaw Center last Wednesday in my robe and hood, I saw myself for the first time as a scholar who had completed something worthwhile and through great effort. I have changed a lot in the past three years.

I know my professional self as a registered nurse, a nurse manager, a teacher, and a student. I am comfortable in these roles. But, I have used being a student as a shield from the realities of life as a working professional, and I feel like I have stepped out from a small room and seen the sky for the first time. I know someday I will see it as beautiful and full of possibility, but for now it just looks scary and infinitely vast. I am going from a position of self-confidence to being a novice in my field again, and it's hard to feel like I have much to recommend myself to those to whom I feel I must now prove my worth.

Our little family is in a state of flux. The basement is still torn apart, we just bought a new car (much earlier than expected - anyone want to pay a couple thousand dollars for a 1997 Odyssey which now will not start?), we have baby number 5 on the way and our little darlings for some reason keep growing up. I feel like I'm grasping a branch at the river's edge - when did life start flowing by so quickly? - but at least I'm in the water with so many people I love and that love me, and there's sure to be some small quiet beach somewhere past the rapids where we can rest for a while.