Transition Work

We just returned from the final "packing up" of our home in Williamsburg, Virginia. I can't really say much about it right now. Leaving that home is so big that I am still standing close to it in its shadow. But I did realize something about life and transitions: there is always work to do in a time of transition. Think of childbirth: the work of labor that comes as you realize your life will never be the same once this little person is born. As a doctor, I think of the work of dying and how often it comes and gives the person a sense that they are ready to move on, to leave this place. This week as I was packing box after box, coveting cardboard and treating Stearlite storage containers as if they were a precious commodity, I realized that moving is tremendous work. But the work is good. It keeps you moving and forces you not to simply sit on the floor and cry. Work was made for good, and sometimes the box after box after box, keeps you moving and allows you to walk through something that you simply couldn't do without the "work" of it.

I wanted to put in these few pictures from our makeshift schoolroom at the Clarke's house. We have finished five weeks of school now. There is much that I like about doing school together, although it has felt a little less than excellent in quality with the constant chaos of a move hovering. In this picture, Henry is coloring on the dry erase board, while Caroline does grammar and John Mac cuts with his scissors. School starts back tomorrow after a week of "vacation"! Hope the students had a better break than the teacher did....