Endings | Trees of Transition

June 27, 2014
by mary.campbell.schuh Leave a comment

The End of Hodge-Podge Jobs and Vacuuming up Dog Toenails

What do peanut M&Ms, cat fur, and a peaceful farmhouse all have in common?

Working at an animal hospital! They aren’t all mixed together, of course.

I didn’t figure out what all the little black bumps were that would rattle up the vacuum tube for a while. Then I shouted out “Ewwwwww!” When I realized they were dog toenails!

Some seasons of life are more thrown together than others. Two years ago I needed a second part-time job to supplement my first part-time job. I asked at a dinner my friends, who are vets, if they were hiring. They were!

It took the business manager weeks to contact me, and by that time I had picked up a tutoring job, but I was open to more work, so a rather big patch got sewn into my crazy quilt of employment.

I’ve had quite the adventures there: Before my boss told me I couldn’t bring in people to help me clean, I dragged several people in. The first guy was a date who wanted to take me dancing, but who I told I couldn’t go unless he helped me get the cleaning done. Oh, wow… Let’s just say I saw that guy walking with another girl the next day. Singing at the top of my voice and dancing around with a mop was fun.

I also dragged my Mom, several friends, and my former boyfriend to clean bathrooms, vacuum, and mop the old farmhouse-turned animal hospital.

Over the two years, I’ve gotten off the time clock to have important talks and text exchanges with family, boyfriends, and potential boyfriends.

I had to clean after 7:30pm on Tuesday and Thursday nights and anytime after 12:30 on Saturdays. I’ve mopped into the wee hours of the morning, but have kept going because of the snack cupboard and ginger ale and water in the fridge.

I must have had a junk food deficiency from being raised by a health-foodie, so their snack cupboard full of M&Ms, snickers, cheese it’s, Doritos, almonds, carmel, and popcorn satisfied that debt.

I have described the job as, “I’m getting paid to listen to podcasts!” At the start I would sing to keep me awake, now I tend to listen to money and relationship advice on podcasts.

This job was my first job to ever get vacation pay or a bonus gift because the business is doing well.

Now that I have found a full-time teaching job with benefits, it’s time to let this job go!

I will miss the peaceful, country-ness it brought to my life, the kind support from my bosses, the snacks, but I will NOT miss cleaning up the spatters of blood and the dog toenails!

June 26, 2014
by mary.campbell.schuh Leave a comment

Ode to the Death of a Computer

Mid-December sun shone into the old farmhouse as I unpacked the box of the refurbished computer. After I pushed the “on” button the Welcome of swirling letters and music made me laugh.

Friends and I snapped silly photos in photo booth, and I loaded hours of music onto the machine.

It made the last semester of paper-writing easier, and helped me graduate, apply for jobs, then apply for grad school.

It typed my way through grad school, crashed once, but I was able to update it and make it better.

This computer connected me to home via Skype to be able to talk I family and friends while I taught in Costa Rica.

I watched “Confessions of a Shopaholic” the night before I flew home and then in the Mexico City airport as I journeyed home.

My grad degree had to be finished of by a grand research paper, and last year my computer and I did it, and I graduated.

It helped me connect with family, friends, and strangers through email, stories, poems, a blog…

On Sunday night, the last DVD it played, Soul Surfer, made me cry from happiness and inspiration.

Then I had known the computer was struggling, but it knonked out on Monday morning, during summer vacation, where I don’t really need it… I have time to be thankful for how the 7 1/2 year old computer helped me accomplish goals and contemplate my next goals… and my next computer…

June 23, 2014
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When Do You Throw Away Old Love Letters?

The envelope in the back of the closet, that gets pulled out once in a while and perused–when should it get thrown away?

Spoken words can be remembered pretty exactly, but when someone writes you a love letter, you can read it over and over and the words feel fresh. You hear the words exactly.

Both of my grandmas had kept the love letters from when they were getting to know their spouses in the 1930s and 1940s. One grandma even had letters from other guys she had dated… It intrigued me to see what my grandpas had written, see their handwriting, and read what they felt about my grandmas.

I’m thankful that my grandmas had saved those letters through moves, turbulence, and after my grandpas had passed away.

So if you know you are going to marry this person, then keep the letters. The cards and words will draw forth memories of sweet and passionate times from the start of your relationship, and possibly help add more sizzle to the current relationship. We forget how to love well at times and need to be reminded.

But after a break-up, then when is it time to pitch those sweet cards and notes into the trash? Do I want my grandchildren to find old notes from someone other than their grandfather?

No, I don’t. Once I’m in another serious relationship I would for sure pitch the letters, but it’s sort of comforting to keep them until then. Or is now the time? Is it healthier to just get rid of them, feel the gap, and trust that the right guy will come?

I think so; I’ll be brave and let them go. Good-bye letters, hello future love!

April 19, 2014
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Last Easter to This Easter: A Year With a Lot of Endings (and a Few Amazing Beginnings)

Endings:
Graduating from Grad School!
A boyfriend ending things.
Moving out of a cute house where I lived with friends.
Lots of okay first dates.
Several second dates.
A few third dates and beyond, then an end. (I’ve found that having a song to listen to after a relationship doesn’t work out is so helpful. Mine is “This is not the End” by Gungor. See: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t5Cjt83wWDk).
My brother-in-law passing away unexpectedly.
A friend from high school dying suddenly.
My grandma passing away.
Friends planning on moving away…

Yesterday was Good Friday, and it pushes you to consider death: Jesus, who didn’t have to die chose to die for us, so that we could have new life and hope if we accept his life in exchange for our wrong-doing. Because death is coming, we desire to fully experience the life we have.

When you fully embrace life, you get to feel greater pain, but also greater joy. If you’re numb then you don’t feel emotions fully. For example, my fears caused me to choose numbness for years, and I was able to “control” my life more, but life wasn’t very fun. Now that I’m learning to feel and not have the numbness, it seems like there’s more loss in my life, but also more joy!

Beginnings:
Life without classes hanging over my head!
A sister getting engaged, and her asking me to be her maid of honor.
Writing more consistently and sharing that writing through a blog.
Moving to a place with a bigger kitchen.
Meeting over a dozen different guys and learning a lot of insightful things from getting to know them a bit.
My nephew came into the world and has brought so much life, joy, and mirth!
New connections with my sisters.
Seeing young people at church and at work keep on growing up to become beautiful young people.

My experience is this: Even with all this messy life, I can have hope because Jesus died AND ROSE AGAIN to bring new life.

Happy Easter!