How I Feel

Since revealing our news about moving to Los Angeles, I have repeatedly been asked how I feel about it. Which is really nice, I liked being asked how I feel about things. It's the way that I am asked that has prompted me to write this post. Most everyone asks me how I feel about leaving our town and family with a look of pity and sadness on their faces, like I am about to burst into tears and tell them that I am in agony over it and cannot possibly see how I will ever survive it. That is not the case though.

This is how I feel:

I have fears. I am afraid that I won't have friends and will be lonely. I am afraid that I won't trust anyone to babysit and will be stuck in hypothetical emergencies. I'm afraid that JD will be gone too much and I will have no one to talk to, no one to enjoy our new state with. I'm afraid of not finding a church that we love and feel shepherded in. I'm afraid that my kids will not know their cousins and aunts and uncles. I'm afraid of the cost of living. I'm afraid that my mom is going to sneak in our luggage and secretly live with us because she cannot handle the thought of me taking her grand babies away. And I'm afraid of celebrities. I have this weird star struck thing happen to me when I see a celebrity of any caliber. I gawk. I can't speak. I point and laugh maniacally. It's not cool. At all. And it scares me. So I know it scares them. Awesome.


But more than my fears, I am really, stinkin' excited. I cannot wait to move. I cannot wait to live miles from the beach and have world class shopping and restaurants at my fingertips. I can't wait to sink my teeth into a new place. I can't wait to experience the adventure of uprooting our lives and starting over somewhere new with my husband and babies. I am really excited. About all of it. And I'm starting to get the feeling that it is not okay for me to feel this way.

From the reactions I get, I'm guessing that I'm not supposed to be happy about the move. I get a lot of sad faces. Faces that wouldn't trade places with me for anything. Faces that make me feel weird, like I am weird for being excited. I'm not talking about any one person in particular. Strangers give me the faces too. The older lady that walks her dog by our place every afternoon around 5 gave me the sad face today when she asked why we're selling. I am seriously wondering if I'm going about this all wrong. Maybe I should have a sad face too?

I know I will have moments of sadness during and after the move. Everything as I know it will be different. But that's kind of what excites me. I'm not afraid of the unknown enough to make me not want to go and do it. I have not always been this way, but I really want to embrace change and make the most of it. I am proud of my husband and his ambitions to do something bigger than the local PD. But I feel like I have to defend that. Because for some reason, that is not how the majority of my people think that I should feel. And it's starting to make me feel weird. More weird than usual. 


I get that a lot of the sad faces from family is about them missing us. I will miss them too, terribly. But I suppose I don't allow myself to focus on that. Things can't stay the same if they're going to change. Does that make any kind of sense? What I mean by that extremely cryptic statement is if more opportunities (financially, professionally, etc) are to become available to us, things have to change (like our address, career, etc). To me, that trade off is worth the sadness of missing family and our familiar life here. Please don't let that sound heartless, please don't let that sound heartless! Plus, we can visit. And Skype. And blog about missing each other. So see, it's all gonna work out!

I'm not bothered by the sad faces and negative reactions I get when I tell people that we're moving 2000 miles away. Some people have different plans for their families, and that's okay. Ours happens to involve moving away from everyone we know and love. And that's okay too. But regardless of how traumatic it may be for all of us, I'm feeling okay about it. I just thought everyone should know. Commence sad faces in unison if you must. I kid.