Living the High Life?

It is late, there is laundry drying, and the house looks roughly like the Muppets had an all night beer bash here, which I assure is not the case... at least not this time. I am tired. It has been a hard month. My wife's grandmother (maternal) stepped into eternity on March 5th. We made it to Lubbock, Texas, for the funeral and family time, despite American Airlines' best efforts to thwart us. But at least getting back was at least as laborious as getting there. We got back and sort of stepped into an overwhelming tide of normality that particularly caught my wife off guard. Then two and half weeks later, my wife had surgery. Not a life-threatening, call in the priest sort of surgery. But a necessary one with some recovery time.

I have been doing my best to care for my wife; cooking, cleaning, making calls, and many other forms of being there. I have to say that I love my wife, and I love being there for her. I also have to say that despite however many years I have choicefully belonged to Jesus, it has been a hard month for me. I am not naturally someone who serves with such constancy, compassion and energy. I find that my own personal limitations have become very... accentuated by the current events in our life together. I am not a multitasker, so if there is laundry to be done, something cooking on the stove, and my wife needs a little TLC--two of those things are just going to have to wait as I seem incapable of satisfactorily diverging my attention to all of the tasks at hand. Generally, this means that the food gets burned and socks get turned inside out for another use.

As I reflect on the upcoming transition, this time has both confirmed my desire to pursue a post-graduate degree in counseling and, at times, called it into question. I look forward to the possibility of being in a profession where it is just me with one other person and their story, with no distractions or picking up that needs to done. I also recognize that in my desire to love and serve my wife, I find that my will and energy are not what I hope or think it should be. And if that is something that becomes a struggle in the most significant part of my life, what will happen when I have 20 people in a week wanting/needing that kind of undivided focus?

Not that I am thinking of not going back to school or not pursuing a Masters in Counseling Psychology, but I am a man with definite limitations. I am coming not only to accept my limitations, but to praise God for them. In the spirit of John the Baptist, "He must become greater; I must become less." In my marriage, my upcoming schooling, and my future professional career, may it be so.