It takes Roughly Nine Years to Travel In a Complete Circle

Here I sit again. In the kitchen. A bag of knitting at my feet while watching the feathery steam float from the top of my hot cup of coffee. The radio in my kitchen plays current pop hit songs and I am at peace. Finally.

Nine years ago I sat the same way, but in a different kitchen, with a different knitting project, a different radio station, and a different feeling in my soul. Trepidation. We started what later became the most difficult years of our lives. I never knew when I started blogging that I would be recording those difficult years. I blogged because it satisfied some need within me to write. I never cared who read my entries, never cared how many hits my blog got, and I still only write to satisfy my own needs. Now, however, I'm thinking of printing off all of my entries to serve as a journal of our journey.

My knitting served a crucial role during this time.

Constancy.

Predictability.

Stability.

It traveled with me as my husband graduated from earning his new professional degree. It sat with us as we sent off hundreds of applications. It came along on the trip to set up his apartment in a new community several hundred miles from our family home. It came along as I carted our oldest daughters to and from activities like a single parent.

My knitting rejoiced when I was hired to work near my husband and our family was finally reunited. The needles and the rhythm of completing each pattern soothed my soul as we moved again and again, lost the equity in our home from mold damage, mourned the loss of my mother-in-law, and it soothed me most when my husband began his battle against cancer.

Now, those things are finally behind us. We sold the property that was weighing us down for years, took our huge financial loss, and still managed to buy a new home. A beautiful home to raise our new family. We moved on my daughter's birthday, a great reason to celebrate many things, but mostly to celebrate life. To celebrate the new lives that will be joining our family later this spring through adoption.

We have waited so long to have traveled in a complete circle.

So here I sit again. Caring for two small sick little girls while the radio pumps out current hits, and my coffee sends curls of steam into the air. The only differences?

I don't feel the same trepidation, even though my husband is undergoing routine cancer testing at this very moment. I feel the joy of my family, even though my little girls are sick. I feel the relief of only owning one property, the home we live in each day. And my knitting?

Well, it's amazing how I had forgotten how difficult it is to knit when there are little ones to be taken care of, but when I get the chance. It rejoices with me in the happiness we have finally found!