the end of an era

The things you think you hate are the things you'll miss the most, and nursing school is no different.
I will miss the late nights studying with friends at the local 24/7 cafe. Some of my best memories of that place are eating chocolate cake at 3 am, or sitting studying with a friend only to find a creeper smoking hookah staring at you two through the window, or the infamous point you hit at 4:30 where you swear you'll never pull an all-nighter...only to find yourself doing the same thing the very next week.
Whatever semester you are in will be the hardest semester. I remember thinking "wow, the classes can't get harder than this" or "I will never be busy like this" only to find out that YES! the classes do get harder and MAN if you thought you were stretched thin before...better wait.
My first semester I remember there was this hands on head to toe assessment that you have to perform to pass the class. I remember praying about it saying "Oh God, just help me get through this last hurdle of nursing school". You pass, you move on. Fast forward to the next semester which you could swear is the hardest semester and you pray "Oh God...please just help me past this semester...I don't think it could get much harder than this...please just let me pass". You see the head to toe assessment people in the hall, and they talk to you to tell you how nervous they are about their assessment, and you literally want to shake them because now the head to toe assessment is the silliest little thing ever. Then you get to the next semester and it's the hardest one...and thus is the vicious circle until you finish (though the last semester is only rough because you don't want to work).
And then there's this moment your last year when it clicks that nursing is so much bigger than the hospital. Nursing is meeting JC goal by using evidence based practice. And who is going to be the forefront of this research? nurses! Who is going to teach the public how to protect themselves from the mess of this world (disease, drugs, illness, etc etc) nurses! Who is with their patient day in and out as they recover in the hospital? nurses! Who is the one that notices the subtle changes that could mean life or death? nurses!
Nursing is so much more multi-versatile that I had expected...and grows each day. I remember some highlights being working with refugees as they tried to integrate into America, seeing the beginning of life in OB, teaching at every health fair or clinic the city had to offer, seeing patient after patient-some whole, some missing parts of their head. And you just love every minute of it because they are all revealing something about Christ. Each person is the image of God, and I would look at them and wonder what God would do to stretch my heart...how would He teach me today?
And this is nursing! There's something for everyone whether you want to "go green", or be all natural, or pharmaceutically driven, or deliver babies, see wounds, teach (kids, adults, elderly), or be an administrator. There's something for everyone because it's all about the care and keeping of human life. And who doesn't love life?

That middle place

where you look back for inspiration and look forward for motivation.

It's the place I am at. Looking back at all the people who've touched me, all the experiences that have shaped me. I see the inspiration from them all. A conglomerate of blessings I had no business taking part of, blessings of which I am so undeserving.

Then I look forward to this future, and I look for motivation. I take it moment by moment in trying to live in the present.

It's all been very anti-climatic, life of schooling and military training ended in a couple of ceremonies and BOOM! Time to actually act on my schooling and not just talk about it.

I am in a different place from many of my other graduates because I will not be looking for a job or worrying about my resume...I just have to be cool with the fact that I don't know yet where I will go (you see I have to be licensed first which means yet another exam given in a standardized way by a state...whew scary). 

So here's where trusting God with the present moment comes in. I do now know where I will go nor for how long. I do not know what I will be doing nor if I will need to do any extra training. And here comes my good friend Jeremiah to remind me "For I know the plans I have for you," declares the LORD, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future."

And the truth is...it's hard. When I look at the past, I want to live in it and not let go. When I look to the future, I get a little scared. How am I supposed to move on without my past? Where am I supposed to go? I know what a weak little soul I am, and oh how easily distracted I get. I see that God has placed me exactly with the proper people, in the proper time and place to have my soul completely flourish in His love. He knows me so well that He knew where to place me in the community I best fit, and it is the blessing of this community that I had no part in. This is what I do not know how to let go of, and I ask God why He would place me in such a beautiful place to have me let go of it. I want God to want my plans as desperately as I want them. But it's really the other way around when living the Gospels...you have to want God's plan as desperately as He wants you.

And so I am here in the middle looking at both the past and my future holding on to this: the present moment. Everything I have worked for has alas come to an end...or a new beginning I have yet to see. God knows the plans, I do not, and this is where I seek solace.