For months, years really, I’ve been wanting to get back into a regular writing habit. And then it happened…
“It” is normal life being cancelled and way more time at home all of a sudden.
But, let’s not start there, let’s go back a few years, to roughly this time in 2016. If you’re keeping score at home, April 13, 2016 was the day the Warriors broke the single season win total for the NBA, dethroning Jordan’s Bulls in the process. It is also the last game Kobe Bryant played, dropping 60 points on the Jazz.
I know because I watched both from a hotel room in Monterey, California with a bunch of high schoolers on their senior class trip. I wrote about that a bit here. It was my third trip to California, but first since being a senior in high school myself.
Back home in Florida, normal life was about to fall apart, but we didn’t know that yet. The previous fall, we had moved into a 4,000 sq ft house with another couple. It was owned by a family friend, and we were all saving on rent by essentially splitting the house. This should have worked great for all involved, except for that the other wife packed up a left the day after my buddie’s birthday in May of 2016. The next time I saw her was at court when their divorce was bring finalized.
That was December of 2017. In the time leading up to that, we began a kind of revolving door of roommates in order to make rent. We could have just moved at the end of the lease, but for what we were paying, we actually couldn’t have found rent cheaper elsewhere. Plus, it was a 4,000 sq ft house, and the master bedroom was a separate wing, so we had some measure of privacy.
The previous May, one of my brother’s in law’s good friends moved in with to start working on his M.Div at RTS Orlando. We bonded over nerdy seminary stuff, and started going to a new church for all of us that summer.
I started serving on the worship team and got to flex my multi-instrumental skills. Plus, the worship director was a big August Burns Red fan, so I found a friend who appreciated classical music (he play cello in a string quartet) and metal (was also in a metal band at one point). When he needed a new place in August of 2018, he moved in with us as well.
A couple of months after that, we found out the family friend was finally going to sell the house, and we needed to figure out a moving plan. My buddy that we originally moved in with was now stable enough to get his own place, and the other two guys wanted to move with us.
So, last April, that’s what we did. It was a major life change, but a fresh air of stability to what had been a chaotic and traumatic living situation. During the spring as well, I began working at the church doing what I had wanted to do since leaving seminary 9 years ago. That fall, we were finally not dependent on any of Ali’s income, and she quit her job by Thanksgiving.
We started off the year with high hopes for getting life on track in 2020. We had a stable living situation, roommate who had become like family, and a church home that healthy and growing.
But then, I got a call the day after the Super Bowl that we couldn’t renew our lease and would have to move again. It came as quite a shock, but we were actually able to find a new place nearby that was the same size for less rent, and signed a lease the following week. We were able to do this because one of our yearly supporters decided to give us a large donation back in December. I wasn’t sure what we’d use the money for, but I figured God knew.
The problem though was that I was committed to, and actively planning, that same senior trip again and we were going to have to move the day after we got back. Last year, we moved about a week after getting back from the trip, and that was awfully soon. I wasn’t sure how it was all going to come together, but I knew we’d figure it out.
And then, everything started to get cancelled. It was a little surreal the last day of school before spring break. I told the students I thought Disney was going to close, and later that day was proven right. Disney for reference, barely closes for major hurricanes. School didn’t resume after spring break, and the trip to California was indefinitely postponed as California was effectively closed for business. Though there are signs they may open sooner rather than later.
We ended up having plenty of time to pack and work out details for moving, and moved last weekend. It’s a much nicer house, and I’d much rather be here for the rest of the stay at home order. There is still uncertainty how long that might be, but the model that was driving policy has proven comically wrong, and in a good way. As I’m writing, we’ve only seen a couple of hundred cases and two deaths in our county of 500,000 people.
And so, now that I’m working from home for the foreseeable future, have stories to tell and books to review, I’m back in the blogging game. As you can see, the last few years have been a bit too chaotic to have the margin to write regularly, but I have been reading and I have been thinking and it seemed like a good time to get back after it.
But first, I need to organize my books…