Seasons of Change

Hi friends.

Psychotherapist Lori Gottlieb said "the nature of life is change but the nature of people is to resist change."

Those words really resonate with me right now. Some of you know that my husband and I moved from our home in northeast Philadelphia to the far end of Chester County, PA in 2024. Since then I've continued working at my previous day job, commuting in from Chester County. It's meant that I've spent about three hours a day just commuting. And in all honesty, I haven't minded. 

A few months ago, I was told that a role very similar to my current job could be opening--significantly closer to our new home. It was suggested that I submit my resume when the job opened. When it did, I submitted my resume and excitedly moved through the interview process and was ultimately offered the job. To say I'm excited about the new role would be an understatement. I really am thrilled.

But I've been where I currently am for a long time. It's been a good time too; it's been a joy filled role and I've honestly loved almost every moment of the job. 

The new job is an incredible and exciting opportunity and I really can't wait to start. That doesn't change the bittersweet feelings around leaving the current place. I've spent years there and I've really come to love everyone who I work with. There've been tears and congratulations. 

I also have no doubt that I will form those same sorts of bonds where I'm going. 

But as Gottlieb said in the second part of her quote, it's natural for people to have intense reactions to change. We become comfortable with what we know and we push against stepping out of what's comfortable. I think this is especially true for queer people.

Changing places, homes, jobs, etc. can be times of even greater anxiety for queer folks because we often don't know just how welcome we'll be. In my case for this transition, I know that I'm welcome and celebrated, there are other queer folks on staff and just walking in the door, you walk under a Progress Flag. 

I didn't realize how much that would mean, seeing it so blatantly displayed. That's not to say that I have ever felt less welcome where I am now. In fact, they too have a flag, however making the decision to display their welcome is much newer and sometimes feels uneasy--not because of leadership, God knows the leadership is nothing but welcoming, affirming and celebrating. 

Where I'm going has been doing this work of welcome since 2013 and it feels amazingly affirming knowing that the work is just a long term part of the new place's DNA. 

It's a strange juxtaposition to the world we live in. 

That tension of welcome while living in such a divided world struck home for Joey and I last week in ways that we've rarely experienced. On Wednesday, Joey called me, quite frankly in a state, to tell me that  someone had thrown a log through our bedroom window. Now, when I say log, I mean a freaking log. An eight and a half inch long log. It was thrown with such force that it smashed through a double pane window, ripped the shade, shear, and curtain from the wall, sailed across the bedroom and smashed into our long dresser, coming to rest on top of it and narrowly missing the dresser's mirror. It sprayed the ENTIRE room in broken glass. We ended up just throwing out our bedding--comforter, pillows, sheets, quilt, all of it--rather than wash it. I didn't want to risk laying in a bed of broken glass and I was concerned about washing the sheets in our washer only for that glass to be deposited in the next load of laundry, like our underwear or something. Now, I'll grant that we can't say that what happened was because of our sexuality; in fact Joey is pretty sure it's related to something that has been happening at his work, but it still, naturally, raises questions and anxiety. 

And in some ways, the reasoning behind whoever lobbed the log as if it were a football is irrelevant, at least in terms of effect. It was still a violation that made us both uneasy in our own home and now we're increasing some of the security things we have and do. I've even put a 9-iron next to my side of the bed.

But I also know that we are far from the only people who feel uneasy or unsafe at home. Queer folks all over the world, and in our own country are faced with that unease every day. Their world is always in that state of change, changing attitudes, changing security, that uncomfortable knowledge that the ground beneath them is unstable and ready to shift and give way in the blink of an eye. 

In seasons of change, we can feel like we're on a stormy sea, with great highs, like new exciting jobs, and incredible lows, like a tree being chucked through your window. It's a difficult thing to acknowledge just how disparate the two are. Especially since the two events happened for me within hours of each other--the log and the job offer. I think sometimes the key to existing in such 'heavy seas' is to remember that neither are the norm. Everyday life is that point of balance, that equilibrium between crest and trough. 

Seas calm and the waterline settles to that point of equilibrium. That's true of almost all things, the turmoil and triumphs we face at home, the turbulence of the world around us, all of it. And if we remember, we do have ways to close the watertight doors to make sure we stay afloat. Meditation, mindfulness practices, intentional breathing; all are ways that help me cope. Sometimes a two minute 'body-scan' can bring back that calm, or some simple breathing exercises--just don't bring yourself to the point of hyperventilation. 

I'm always happy to talk to you about my own 'watertight doors.'

So, find what works for you, reach out if you need to, learn new strategies, celebrate the crests and hold on in the troughs.

We all have it in us to weather these seasons of change.

And always remember:

You are seen. You are loved. You matter.