I keep thinking that I will write about the past few weeks, or perhaps the coming few weeks. But when I sit down to start typing, it all feels too big and personal. The family is very private, so I will probably not write much about it here, at least not now. At the moment, I don’t feel like it's my call. Mister Husband has written a small bit about it here.

The bare facts are that I am currently living in my terminally ill mother-in-law's small house in a small town on the border between Oklahoma and Arkansas. I am visiting her in the nursing home room I arranged for, teaching my online course, and learning to renovate a house. I am learning that my marriage can indeed easily withstand periods of long-distance-ness, although this is certainly not our preferred state. (We are trading teaching stints in Minnesota, more or less.) I am learning that there is much satisfaction in duty.

These past eight months have brought a significant illness for my spouse, the quick death of a grandparent I had a complicated emotional relationship with, and now the slow death of a matriarch in the family. I think the universe is teaching me to breathe and to just be there for whatever needs to be done, to remember to take time for the big events in life. I am learning, albeit ungracefully.