Canniversary

Tomorrow marks two years since that fateful April Fools' Day, when the unthinkable happened and we survived.
In the midst of learning to be parents, in the midst of preparing for our nephew to come live with us, my husband came home early from work and told me, and my six-month-old baby, that he'd suddenly and unexpectedly been let go from the church at which he'd been working for almost three years.
That experience, and all the ups and downs in between then and now, taught me more than any other experience save becoming a mom. Here are some things I have learned in these two crazy years:
~Square pegs don't fit in round holes. From the interview process through that final awful day, it was clear we did not fit at that church.
~I don't ever want to hold my tongue for the sake of self-preservation. I cannot count the times I listened in silence to so much misogyny, so much homophobia, so much general ignorance, fearing that if I stated my true beliefs my husband's job might be at risk. You see how swimmingly that worked out. Never again.
~God really takes care of us, and things always work out. Incidents that seemed catastrophic ended up working out in our favor. This point is actually difficult for me because, while it holds true over and over, it doesn't necessarily fit in with my broader theology. Daily, more devout better mothers on the other side of the world watch their children starve, and my family has wanted for NOTHING. Why? I guess that's another post for another day.
~The people you think will be there for you when things get tough may not, and people you never thought of might turn out to be anchors.
~Your "plan" is only as solid as every last, blessed aspect that could possibly go haywire.
~What's better than a good-paying job with great health insurance? Seeing my husband and him being able to witness and enjoy our baby becoming a little girl.
~The most recent BIG lesson I've learned is the value of practicing positivity. At the end of last year, when our future seemed a bit bleak once again, I stumbled across this blog post and was inspired, to say the least. Sometimes, I fall back into my cranky old ways (ok, a do that a LOT), but I am determined to choose how I face challenges and react to setbacks, and to try to maintain a ridiculous optimism. And when I manage to do that, it really does work. Things go much more smoothly, and life is generally more beautiful.