Coned

Over the course of the last several weeks, Toby has had several needles stuck in his legs and probes stuck up his rear end in an effort to prepare him for export.  As a result, he has felt the need to itch and pick and dig at the various locations of the injections.  Therefore, Dave and I felt we had no choice.  For his benefit, we had to cone him.  He did not like it, and tried several times to yank it off.  It was hard to communicate to him that we were doing it for his own good, that this way his scabs could heal and not be bothered.

Over the course of the last several weeks, I have had several small panic attacks about moving to Belfast.  Immediately following a miscarriage and thinking about how to get pregnant again, moving to a new country was the last thing I felt that I could handle.  Moving to a new country is scary and anxiety-provoking for me.  My international travel consists of one country: Canada.  I have never needed to use a passport.  This move is way out of my comfort zone.  How could I prepare myself for something this big when I can hardly focus on anything other than loss?  This past Thursday and Friday, Dave and I had lunch with a dear priest from my childhood, and a dear chaplain from Hope, respectively.  Both of them gave me the same message: use the time in Belfast as a gift where all I have to do is grieve the loss of my baby.  As I thought about it more and more, it struck me that in a way, God was coning ME.  Was Divine intervention in the works here, coinciding our trip to Belfast (where I have no official duties) with a miscarriage so that my scabs could heal and not be bothered?

One week from today, we will be in another country, another time zone, another continent.  It excites me on the one hand, but also terrifies me on the other.  A popular question for people to ask me lately is, "what will you do while you are there?"  Dave has research and a teaching position to which he is heading, something to keep him busy.  I am stressed out because I will have nothing to do, nothing to keep me busy.  Keeping busy is something that I like; sitting and reading a book or sitting and knitting are challenges for me.  Part of my anxiety was related to "how will I fill my time?"  However, after some thought-provoking conversations on Thursday and Friday, I am trying to look at the positive side of a "cone" (a.k.a. unpredictable trip) channeling my energy and changing my orientation towards more of a question like, "how will God fill my time?"  And thus, I am trying to now think of this as gift, a sabbatical from busyness and an opportunity to grow my ability to just be still and in the moment.  Dealing with grief will be part of those moments, but I also hope that learning about a new culture and immersing myself in a new way of living will also become part of those moments.  In our final days in the U.S., I am working to allow my new-found "cone-vision" to prepare myself to relax, sit back, and be still in a year of new and unexpected moments.