Well. I did it. I applied for a job. I interviewed for a job. I took a job. I showed up at a job. I even completed my first week at a job. And it was terrifying. Which I’m aware is absolutely ridiculous. I am a grown ass woman, after all, that has done many grown ass woman things over my grown ass woman life. Some way more terrifying things than getting a job. But I am who I am. And this going back to work thing has been haunting me for years.

It was an emotional first week, to the say the least. It started with returning Jack (and one of his new besties) to Combine. And props to me, I held my shit together the whole time (helps that I’m going back to see him Martin Luther King weekend). Until the drive home where I dedicated a solid hour to being a little bitch baby. While I feel as though I’ve done a good job adjusting to my first born being gone, having him home for 3+ weeks was nothing short of fantastic, and returning him, while knowing after Martin Luther King weekend, I probably won’t see him for months, is a swift kick in the pants with steel toed boots. Side note – I don’t even have the proper equipment for that to be super painful, but I imagine, even without the proper equipment, it will hurt like a mother fucker. Much like not seeing my first born for a couple of months.

Also plaguing my anxious mind was the job I was to begin the very next day at our local high school. I took an instructional assistant position where I am responsible for overseeing the students taking online courses at our local community college. Is it complicated? Absolutely not. But as with anything new, and me being me, I have certainly over complicated it in my mind. Here’s just a run down of some of my anxious thoughts: First of all, kids? What the hell am I thinking? Certainly I mostly sometimes like my own kids. Others I’m not so sure about. What if they hate me? What if they don’t listen? What if I sound like an idiot? What if I hate them? I’m not so good at hiding my feelings from my face. What if the ladies in the library (where my class is stationed) hate me? How will I know what to do? There’s no one to train me. How do I even get in the building? Where do I go to the bathroom? Where will I eat lunch? What will I pack for lunch? What if absolutely no one likes me? Why am I sacrificing my freedom to do this? Is the juice worth the squeeze (one of Ash’s favorite questions to pose when making decisions)? What will I wear? Can I wear jeans? No one told me the dress code. What if my mom gets sick of picking Colt up from school every day? What if Colt needs me? How do I take my dogs to the vet? What about all my upcoming travel plans? You get the idea. A real fucking disaster up in my brains.

I did sleep well the night before. Thanks to Xanax. Sometimes a girl’s gotta do what a girl’s gotta do. I mean, read above. Ain’t no way I was rawdogging sleep. And I arrived on my first day. And I was let into the building. And thankfully I have a friend in administration and she basically held my hand as much as possible on my first day. Not literally. I imagine we would have gotten some interesting looks had we held hands all day. But she helped ease me in, showed me the way, made me as comfortable in my new role as she possibly could. I figured out going to the bathroom and lunch and nobody seems to hate me just yet.

After a full, successful week (where I probably told those I love most that they should really be throwing me a party for this huge milestone – it’s a joke but also not a joke. I haven’t worked a full time job in about 16 years. And I just dove in, after attempting to test the waters a number of times and turning back around. For me, this is a big accomplishment. So, yes, I wanted a party. I didn’t get one, though, which is just as well because I was tired as fuck from working all week) there’s still the “is the juice worth the squeeze” in the back of my mind. But as with anything, only time will tell. So I showed up on week 2. Cheers to me. The heat’s not quite working, so that’s a bit unpleasant. My nose and fingers are frozen. But likely I’ll survive.

As far as the weekend went, there’s nothing like a full time job to make you really appreciate your days off. As stated earlier, Friday I was exhausted. Colt and I got some hibachi and watched Lord of the Rings for the millionth time. Seriously, I could do a dramatic telling of the whole series, probably verbatim. He had a piece of his art on display at a local art gallery on Saturday so we ventured to check that out. It was a beautiful sunrise ocean scene complete with a pirate ship and Capt. Jack Sparrow (obviously) that he made completely out of torn construction paper. Pretty impressive. My arting abilities are less than none so he clearly didn’t get that talent from me. He then went on to spend some time with his grandmother while I met a friend at the movies.

We saw Mufasa. It was quite good much to my surprise and has me thinking I probably need a pet lion. Bright side, if it eats me, I don’t have to work anymore. I kid! Work is, well, it’s work. But it gets me out of the house and around other humans, which I probably need more than I’m willing to admit.

Anywho, Mufasa. Unpopular opinion, but The Lion King was never my favorite movie as a child. Much like real life, Disney movies from my childhood always had a scary part that I never learned to appreciate. I just like butterflies and rainbows and happiness. Real life is frightening enough. I didn’t also need it in my entertainment. However, as I’ve aged, I’ve learned to appreciate the scary and the difficult because without the imperfect, you’ll never realize when something is close to perfect. I just went off on a tangent. Back to my point. While watching Mufasa, it brought up memories of this book Jack used to love as a tiny tot. It’s called The Water Hole and I absolutely hated that book. Jack, however, absolutely loved it and insisted we (Ash or I) read it Every. Fucking. Night. It tells the story of an African drought and what happens to the animals when there’s no water sustaining their life. It was extremely depressing. Until the end when it rains and rains and rains and rains. And all the animals come back to the water hole. Happy enough ending. The book is beautifully illustrated. And I guess it’s a good story. Seemed a little depressing to be a children’s book. Well, until seeing Mufasa, I had completely forgotten about this book, about it being Jack’s favorite, about how when Ash read it, he did so using an African accent, or what he equated to an African accent. And It made me quite emotional. Yet again.

That’s the thing about grief. Certainly life goes on. We are absolutely living and we are mostly happy. But the grief is always lingering, ready to poke it’s head out, without any warning, reminding you of what you had and what you’ve lost. I was driving Colt to school the other morning and all of a sudden had a thought that I hadn’t checked Ash’s email in months. It was something I had done every day. While he was alive (because checking email and responding to said emails wasn’t one of his gifts) and even after he passed. And I don’t even remember stopping. It wasn’t a planned thing. I just stopped. I mean, there was really no point to checking his email. Most of it is junk or things related to the business we no longer own. It was just something that made me feel connected to him. And realizing that I had inadvertently disconnected hurt my heart. It is also another necessary part of moving forward with life.

In summation, I have a job that I am actually working. I miss my oldest. I’m loving my time with my youngest. Ash is still dead. And grief is still lurking as it has been. As it always will be.