at the jumping-off place

Well, it's official. We are moving to Bastrop.


It sounds sudden when I put it like that, but it's been in the works at some level for a long time. When Scott and I first got married, we planned and daydreamed where we might settle down someday, and Bastrop was on our short list. It's half an hour outside of Austin, in the middle of a randomly beautiful piece of Texas covered with hills and pine trees. It's decently close to Scott's parents, and it's close enough to Austin that Scott can attend trainings and possibly move into a different position in DPS without relocating the family.


So it's been in the plans for a while. Choosing the timing has been a bit tricky, but the plain truth is that we're outgrowing our house. We're going to have to upsize before too long anyway.


And there it is. I can tell you the reasons why. I can spell them out logically, and it all makes sense.


And in the grander scheme of things, I'm happy and excited. But in the day-to-day steps of making it all happen, our lofty goals are foggy and unclear in my view. The future is out there, but I don't know what it looks like. Much more real are the steps of extricating myself from the life we've built here. Getting our house ready to sell. Looking for a new job. Pulling those lofty reasons back out of the fog to show them to our friends and explain why we're leaving, over and over and over again. It makes me tired and it feels strange. Sometimes, like right now I find myself waiting to wake up from this weird dream. (Denial beats keeping my house squeaky-clean for showings, anyway.)


Ah, I probably sound depressed. I'm not. This move is something we've worked for, prayed about, and looked forward to for a long time. But "someday" and "today" are two very different things, and I'm not always the greatest with change. (Last night I realized that one of the "newer" t-shirts in my pajama rotation is 12 years old.) And beyond just change, uncertainty is pretty much terrible. I like being able to think a couple months ahead and know approximately what the horizon will look like. Once time passes and a few more things get figured out, I'll be able to rest a bit easier. Until then, I just need to have a little patience and a little faith.