Anchovy Paste

Today, I purchased anchovy paste....a first for me for obvious reasons.

I try not to think about that magic ingredient in Caesar salad dressing.  However, when one wants to make a homemade Caesar dressing....one needs anchovy paste.

Yuck.

But perhaps that is a perfect ending to the week.

A bit strange.  A bit unpleasant.  But needed for the big picture (or salad).


This was a week I needed more space and less human interaction.  So while trying to juggle being tactful to those around me, I found ways to carve out little pieces of time for myself.  One afternoon I spent several hours at the park with the laptop, typing up lists and organizing information for Nate.  I think that might have been the highlight of my week.  A bit strange, I know.  But it was something tangible I could do, a task I could complete independently, outside in a space free from any obligations other than the tasks in front of me.  I felt a little more like myself for those few hours.

Because, this phase of life has been a lot like starting a new job.  Except every aspect of your life is a new job.  I am learning to live with extra roommates, figuring out a rotating schedule of who's cooking what night, figuring out eating preferences, cooking for 4 instead of 2, learning a new church culture, learning where things are located in the community, learning what stores are what and where to mail a letter, learning how to walk from point A to point B, so on and so on.  None of this is overly exceptional.  Any individual who moves from one place to another would experience most of these things.  But it is exhausting.

That exhaustion has caught up with me and I had tears streaming down as I laid in bed one night.  Wanting so desperately to have a place to call my own and find a normal rhythm to life again.  A bit unpleasant.  But I realized a part of me just needed to acknowledge that it's okay to feel bad.  (Yes, Mom....all in all we really are doing great.)  But we still don't understand why this is happening, and perhaps we never will know all God is accomplishing through it.  The journey has parts that are unpleasant, uncomfortable, and painful for me.

I can't say why this is all needed for the big picture, but I'm trusting that it will make a heck of a Caesar salad someday.