Julius The Snake from 7/10/12 - 9/14/12

For the past few years I have had a longing in my heart for a pet snake. Joe and I would stop into pet shops here and there and hold the ball pythons and every time we would leave I would feel a piece of myself being left behind. On Tuesday, July 10, 2012, I arrived home to find a little baby ball python chillin' in his deluxe new dessert oasis. Joe had surprised me! 

Little Julius

When I told my sister, Rebekah, about our new pet, she said she remembers(she remembers everything!) me being jealous of our friend, John Rickenbacker, when we were younger and he got a pet snake. So apparently this has not been just a recent thing. 

From the beginning, Julius had a hard time eating. He started to get really small and then he started breathing out of his mouth and we thought he might have a cold. Joe took him to the vet and Julius was diagnosed with a respiratory infection. Before Julius went to the Vet, we didn't actually know whether he was a boy or girl. Dr. Funk(yes, that is his real name) informed Joe that Julius was a boy(good thing since we gave him a boy name!) and so Joe got himself an idea. Joe went to a local bakery and had them bake a cupcake with blue icing in the middle. I got home one day after work and this was in the fridge....

I really thought that Julius was a boy, not for an actual legitimate reason but because I feel like all snakes are boys. 

Julius is a BOY!!! 

We love Julius. 

In the excitement of all of this, Julius was still sick and we were still worried about him. For two weeks we would take him out of his cage while I held him and Joe gave Julius one little drop of antibiotic. He seemed to be getting better and he even started to shed. 

This past Friday I got home from work and was resting after a long week. Joe arrived home soon after with Julius in his portable box and I knew something was wrong. He told me he found Julius with his neck bent all crooked in his cage and took him to the Vet immediately. Joe was informed that Julius was brain dead and dying. He knew I would want to say goodbye so he brought him back home and I got to hold him one last time. I was holding him when he took his last breath and turned cold. Heartbreaking. 

We loved Julius and his calm personality. He never struck at anyone and put up with people of all ages holding him. We really wanted him to make it and did all we could to give him his best shot.

Making Friends

In moving to the AZ, there was a lot of unknown. We had no jobs, only seen photos of our condo, visited the area once in our entire life, and had very few connections. One of the few things we did know was that once we arrived to our new home, we wanted to build relationships with people that we would be around while we were doing those basic life tasks that we do. 

When we moved into our first apartment as a married couple, in Seattle, we were already spread very thin and had very little extra time to get to know our neighbors, people in Joe's classes or his internship. This meant that most every time we wanted to spend time with friends it had to be a planned event, which is exhausting and frustrating trying to coordinate schedules every time you want to cross paths. 

So we made a decision. We wanted our friends to be people we worked with, lived near, and served beside so that we could share the little moments in life instead of every time we are spending time with friends asking questions like, "so how has your last month of life been since that last time I saw you?" Of course our friends in Seattle were worth the effort, but we figured while we are in the beginning stages of finding people who will hang out with us, it would nice to have friends that we also are going to see unplanned. 

We are taking things slow, which is painful for me because we all know I am lacking in the patience area and tend to be more of a attacker than a responder, but it has been fun to have the time to build good friendships with my coworkers, our neighbors and eventually people in our community who we can serve with. Because I have so much time I am able to capitalize on my love language that is so near and dear to my heart; gift giving. One of my coworkers, Cathy, is driving up to Northern California this weekend to pick up her grandkids to live with her. So I put together a travel pack(shown below) to let her know we are thinking about her and to encourage her with the stress of a long drive. I love having the time to do these things and hope that I am able to love the people around me well for the rest of my life. 

One thing that I have felt a little impatient about is finding girlfriends who I can be open and honest with that understand my heart. I love T.J's(Joe's best friend) wife Jaci but they have actually accepted a job in Kansas and will be moving in the near future. I was at the gym today and saw a girl about my age who looked nice and thought about asking her if she would be my friend but then her friend or boyfriend came up to her and they left. I was left still thinking through ways I could start chatting with her which made me feel like I was trying to throw down a pick up line. "So do you work out much?"

Like I have said before, moving to a new place has its challenges but I am learning so much and am enjoying the process as much as I possibly can. I am thankful that Joe and I are here together and in the midst of making friends, I have my best friend with me. 

The Experience of Freedom

I was sitting in the office of my counselor and in my mind I was thinking about sharing something that I had never told anyone. I had just started to be able to put words on something I had felt for a long time, but the words had not actually come out of my mouth and in my mind it still felt like a jumbled mess. "I feel like something is keeping me from success," I said. Still nothing was clear in my mind but at least I had started the conversation. Chris then probed with a typical counselor question and being the external processor that I am, a jumbled mess of words came out.

For a long time I had felt that something was holding me back from flourishing, from being my best self. There have been times in my life where I have sabotaged or felt paralyzed by the situation I was in. The year after I graduated college, I worked at an accounting firm in Auburn. My first day I was at lunch and one of my coworkers said, "Sarah is going to make us all look bad and set a new standard." In that moment I decided I was going to lower my productivity because something in me did not want to succeed. In my classes at Auburn I felt like I was butting up against a brick wall as I was trying to understand the material. Sometimes I would even experience physical barriers such as blurry eyesight, anxiety, and migraines. I didn't receive that grades that I know I was capable of, and in a weird way, I wanted it that way. Even in my first few years on staff with the Navigators I would avoid situations that would possibly lead to what many people would see as "success" in ministry. I had coffee with a girl in a sorority who was very interested in starting up a Bible-study and I never called her back. Although each of the situations can be explained away by other reasons, I know in my heart that I was being intentional in experiencing that results that I did.

After I rambled on I asked Chris if I was making any sort of sense and he said definitely. What I was experiencing was a desire to be loved for who I am, not how I performed. Although in a twisted way I had spent my life trying to earn my value by my actions, I was only letting myself achieve results to a certain point. I wanted to know I was loved the same even if I never did anything worth recognizing for the rest of my life. As we talked I felt that walls crumbling down around me. Freedom to reach my full potential was something I allowed myself to consider.

I have been working as an accountant for a company called Two Brothers Distributing Co. for about a month. I am amazed at the freedom I have been experiencing. I feel I am "flourishing" and I have already experienced such a difference from my last experience as an accountant. After two weeks of work, I was promoted to be the head accountant, which includes higher pay and more responsibility. Although it is overwhelming at times and I wonder if they really know what they have done in giving me this position, I do feel capable of the job and have already received much positive feedback on the work that I have done.

Although it is easy to feel like my first 25 years of my life were a waste(a little dramatic, I know), I trust that God is sovereign and I am so thankful that I have these times where I realize my need for Jesus. I am so thankful for his grace and that he gives me freedom I do not deserve. I am looking forward to the ways that God wants to use my life and the unique ways he has created me to love those around me and experience this abundant life.

Things I have been in to lately:

Reading(just got my library card), fruit gummies from Target, learning Arabic words from my Lebanese coworker, working out with our new gym memberships(just tried Zumba yesterday!) and pool time with Joe which includes floating in our floats with fruity beverages while listening to music and chatting about life. 

I have always enjoyed journaling. I am an external processor and so maybe it was the ear I needed when no one was around to listen or maybe a place I could say things and feel sure about not being judged. The past year I have found it difficult to focus my thoughts to write them down and even more so to allow myself to think about things in the depths of my heart, exhausted by the thought of the emotion that might follow. I am experiencing freedom from depression and it feels so good. To feel light hearted, less overwhelmed, hopeful, more trusting now feels like a treasure rather than something I take for granted.

Our move to Arizona was a good decision. It is strange how a change in environment can give the heart a fresh start. It is definitely more comfortable and easy to stay where you are when you feel the tug for a new direction, but along with the challenges of finding familiarity, building new relationships, and pursuing new careers there is a freedom in starting something new. In Seattle I learned so much about myself. I learned more about how I have been created, the passions I have, and freedom from lies that I had been living in for most of my life. I am excited to be involved in things that parallel with the gifts and talents that I have. 

So here I am with a blog. It is my next step in moving towards health and joy, sharing my heart with the people I love. Giving myself a place to stop and put things on "paper" that are on my mind. So many things are new for Joe and me and I feel like this blog can also be a place where I can share the new things and how we feel about them. 

Just a little bit of a change in scenery!