Don't lose hope -- it's simply time to grow

I'm currently trying to decide what to do with my life.  I know this sounds crazy, since I'm ancient--37 years old!  But basically, I finally had my dream job as a publisher at a newspaper--and after I lost that job it's not even as if a window opened...someone knocked over a damn wall.  There are so many choices and opportunities. And it's not just for me...it's for all of us.  Do you have any idea how much is out there?  It's amazing really.  And for the first time I feel like the avatar in a video game, but there isn't any regeneration or plus-ones to get bonus lives.  There's just one life--one chance.  So I better pick something I want to do and that I love.  Whether I need to make money, want to do something I enjoy...have more time with my family.  NOW is my chance to make it happen.

You know, it's funny because right before what I'll call "the big buyout of 2020"--before another company came in and I lost my job...I think God tried to prepare me. 

Side note: Don't think I'm some hoity toity religious person.  I was in high school, but after life kicked me in the teeth a few times (especially when my son died), I'm not a snob now. It's strange that God still seems to reach out to me.  I'm not the best Christian ever: I have the heart of a giver and the mouth of a sailor (when I'm not around my mom or my children).  And if anyone has ever been a modern-day Jonah, running...that's me.  It's not that I don't love God, because I definitely do.  I'm just so innately flawed and honest about it.  Being a Christian for me is setting myself up for failure.  I don't want to say "I'm a Christian," then go hang out with a bunch of people who seem to be perfect when I'm clearly not.

Anyway, the week before my life changed, I sat on my front porch.  For some reason I started studying all the trees in my neighborhood.  They're all groomed and beautiful...perfect shapes like you'd picture seeing perched in the Queen of Hearts' garden.  I suddenly felt every bit Alice, in some magical place where plants grow so beautifully and people care so much.  That's when I spied the tree across the street; that tree is lumpy.

No one takes care of the tree across the street; it has Albert Einstein hair except one side is twice as long as the other.  And as I discovered all of its strange intricacies, the thing suddenly became so beautiful.  It was fascinating seeing which branches reached toward the sky, or those that extended near the house.  I could hardly believe how gorgeous it is!  And then I realized that by the neighbors letting that tree grow, they helped it become the most striking tree on the block.

(I hope they won't read this.  They probably just don't like trimming the thing.)  BUT seriously--it's gorgeous.

So, as I prepared to write my post today, I saw that tree across the street and felt that it's somehow me.  I have room to grow now--NOW is my chance.  When one door closed, God just didn't open a window, He knocked out a wall.  I honestly have no idea what the future will hold, but I'm excited. It doesn't really matter what comes our way because a good foundation is what stands the test of time.  I have faith right now despite unemployment, the coronavirus and a struggling economy; even chaos has a pattern that makes sense of everything--when we can't always understand.  If anything, this is one for the history books.   

I may be Jonah, but even I know that God has a plan.

Hoping a whale doesn't come to swallow me,
Elisa