Letting Go

Last night before going to sleep, Mr. Squire and I had a conversation that made me very sad.  

We recounted how difficult his last four years of teaching have been--both for him as a teacher, and for me as the girlfriend/fiancee/wife of a teacher who was constantly wiped out and in need of endless cheering up and encouragement--and how it is clearly time for him to go.  We remembered how excited he had been to leaving the banking world behind and go back to school to get his masters in education--and how the masters program turned out to be a huge disappointment.  We recalled the struggles he has had in each of the three inner-city middle schools at which he taught in Boston and here in Brooklyn.  His stint at each school began with such anticipation and promise...and left him totally exhausted and drained.  

When I go before God to talk about these things, I don't know what to say.  I am confused about why God would call Mr. Squire to education, only to allow the last four years of misery to take place.  I am curious about what the real point of this whole exercise was.  I am deeply disappointed that it appears we have nothing to show for the last four years of sacrifice.  And the last four years of sacrifice were not only filled with Mr. Squire's efforts; they were also filled with mine.  Virtually no one sees how tough it is to be the spouse of this type of teacher.  I know God sees it.  And I had persevered, mostly with joy, for the past four years, always holding out hope that things would get better...and that the harvest of reward (i.e. reaching many more inner-city kids with quality education) would follow.  I knew we did this for justice, and justice is worth it.  Shining God's love into kids' lives is worth it, I thought.  But...that's not how things have turned out.  And it hurts.  

Then there was the second half of last night's conversation.

If God calls kids, He called me.  Or so I thought.  Now I question everything, including whether my ability to hear God's voice is actually just my own ability to imagine fantastical things.  How scary is it to conflate the two?!  

Here I am, on the other side of literally two decades of focused study, work, and professional preparation:  valedictorian of my high school, straight A's in college (except for one AB), an Ivy League law education, three years at a big firm, and a federal clerkship.  Not to mention the economic discipline of saving for law school since before reaching double-digit age, putting myself through college and law school, then repaying all the loans that came with that endeavor.  And all the while, sitting like a duck among geese in terms of lifestyle because I'm still waiting--I'm STILL WAITING!--to transition to the that which I thought God had called me.

What does one do when one discovers that the bulk of her life's work has no clear purpose?  I don't know what everyone else does, but at this moment, this particular one is weeping on the inside (and sometimes on the outside).  Deep down, I mourn.  I mourn the loss of a dream.  I mourn the feeling that I have been chasing a mirage (for decades, no less), only to discover that it actually is a mirage.  I mourn the loss of hearing God's voice--or worse yet, the realization that perhaps I never heard it at all.

Then mourning turns to fear.  If I didn't hear God's voice before, what the heck have I been doing all my life?  And what should I do moving forward? How can I cut my losses?  How can I make things right and put myself on the right path again?  

Fear turns back to confusion... I have seen (or have I?) God provide all along, opening the right doors--doors that appeared out of nowhere, doors not of my own creation.  I have seen Him guide me (or have I?) through paths I could not have imagined.  The path seemed so ordained as it was being cut out, and I followed in wonder, knowing that God threshed out a path for me (or did He?).

Confusion turns back to fear.  My biggest fear is that I will waste my life, die and go to heaven, and God will reveal to me that I didn't do what He had designed me to do during my time on Earth.  That thought devastates me.  Nothing makes me feel worse.  

I'm totally at my wit's end.  I'm not in a bad place, looking from the outside in (and even from the superficial inside looking out).  But in the spiritual sense, I feel weak and pitiful, shriveled up and cast down.  What I need--I think--is to let go.  Let go of the past, let go of the things I thought, let go of the dream, let go of the vision, let go of TWENTY YEARS OF WORK.  And just walk, one foot in front of the other, and pray for God to do what He will.  Let my life not be a waste. Forget about the rest... right now, that's all I ask.