Gaining Control

Mark came home Friday with the announcement that the science courses at the high school will be changing district-wide. Notably, the course he is responsible for teaching will be now offered in the middle school, and his course will be replaced by something resembling environmental science. Mark has never loved the school he's been at, but he's endured because he has really liked what he's taught. Now he doesn't have that holding him. Meanwhile, as I've mentioned before, my position is in peril due to funding, so my future looks very unclear now. I'm guaranteed a job, but not the one I have.

Considering we've already begun to get our house ready to put on the market, in some ways it seems like the stars are aligning for us to make a big change. We've always talked about moving to a small mountain town, but it's never been the right time. Is this finally it? The housing market certainly isn't in our favor, and I still don't know definitively about my position, and, oh yeah, we're having a baby in three months, so not everything is pointing us in one direction.

In times like these, I don't find myself totally stressed out, but I do feel a heightened sense of responsibility to be doing research and thinking about such big decisions. There are so many things out of my control, like whether we'll be able to sell our house, what my job will look like next year, and when the baby's coming (although we do know somewhere near May 7), that I tend to want to do whatever I can to feel like I have some sort of control over something.

Before we're anywhere near the process of looking for new jobs or narrowing the areas we'd be interested in moving to, I have begun researching teaching salaries and housing prices all over the state. I eagerly grasp at whatever I can that bears a slight resemblance to being able to control my future, even though it has no bearing on the actual outcome. Some people put off all the research fact-finding until things are definite and they have a clear direction they are heading. I do the opposite. Research in all directions so that whatever happens, I will hopefully have a little background knowledge. This trait has really been brought out in me the past few months.

Life feels very uncertain right now, but not in a scary way, not today. Ask me again when the baby's due in a week and I'm interviewing for jobs all over the state, and I might have a bit of a different attitude. But for now, I'm coping the best I know how and attempting to take things day by day. When Mark and I are in the right frame of mind, we're pretty good at looking at changes such as these as an opportunity. I do my best to hold onto that perspective.