Ch-ch-changes

I'm trying hard to break out of the funk I wrote about a few weeks back. In some ways I'm getting there, in other ways I'm still mired in the muck. I mentioned back then that one of the main reasons for being stuck in the rut was there was a lot up in the air. I wasn't very specific then but now I can be just a little more.

First, back in November my wife and I became apartment-dwellers again. We hadn't lived in an apartment since our first year of marriage and the transition back was difficult, especially in light of the fact that this apartment was in a college town, which always drops the median age (and maturity) by a decade or two. Generally speaking the place is nice but we have missed our house, our home. We built that one from the ground up (well not personally but you get the idea). We picked out the colors, chose the floor plan, and added in all the features that we wanted. Many times we got frustrated because our house was less than perfect, but in the end we were sad to say good-bye as it was truly ours. Nevertheless, convenience and logic dictated that we sell it and move to Norman so my wife could be closer to school as being a PhD student demands all of your time, usually in random chunks that make it hard to commute such a distance.

So we made the move. However, apartment life is difficult to return to when you've had your own house. You give up your garage, your privacy, your peace, and so much more. At the time an apartment seemed best as we weren't sure what the future held for us and we were fearful of making a long-term commitment in Norman. But in the past few weeks we've gotten a peace about finding a house. I'll save the details for you, whether its buying or renting, timing, location, and all that stuff but the point is that there is a sense of resolution now regarding making Norman our home and I think that makes both of us breathe a little easier.

Another major holding pattern going on in life had to do with my job. For the past year I've worked at a small/medium sized state agency as their Network Administrator. I have enjoyed my time there and it was good therapy following my season in ministry but it felt like it was time for a change. Computer work is something I've been good at, which is nice because it pays pretty well, but it's not exactly a passion of mine and I spend my time doing it usually to pay the bills. That's a difficult thing when you're trying hard to not get caught in the cycle of just doing a job for the money, which could easily have become the case there. Add to that my commute, literally from the far south side of Norman to the north side of OKC and the time for change seemed to be quickly upon me. Fortunately an opportunity opened up at OU and so in two weeks I will begin a new position there. It's strange how things worked out. I didn't seek the position and yet as I learned more about the job I began to see it as something I could get passionate about. It is still in the IT realm, but it is much less hands-on technical support and more management. I will be overseeing all the student labs on campus. I've yet to see a single one but they tell me there are about 100 of them, ranging in size and scope. I'll be supervising all the lab employees which will be a great experience for me and will give me the chance to work with students again. The IT department in the process of trying to re-think their computer labs and work to make them fresh and exciting and visioneering is definitely a passion of mine. OU is one of the Top-10 wired campuses in the country and was ranked on the list of the top 100 places to work in IT in the business world so the environment is awesome. And so I'm very, very excited about this new work that I'll be doing. I'm sad to leave the wonderful people I've worked with. You couldn't ask for better co-workers, but in the end this will be a good change.

So as you can see, some major life "stuff" has now been settled and that helps to stir me from my funk. We'll see what comes from here.

Peace
-Paul