girlonahalfshill

I can’t sleep. After months of travel, I didn’t expect tonight to be different than so many other night’s when I faced ambitious plans the following day. Months of preparation have gone into tomorrow’s event. It seems somehow appropriate that the Olympics kick off tonight. In my own small way, this feels like an Olympian effort that we’re launching tomorrow.

People move cross country all the time. Many have sacrificed so much more than I am to strike out in a new direction and find opportunities for their families. I’m just the next one in a long, long line. Hunting educational advancement, gathering experiences.

And tomorrow, no, later today. It starts in a few hours. The sky is already colored a dusky rose and the stars have receded. My mind isn’t spinning. I can find fatigue, but not sleep.

It is already after 7 am on the East Coast, our soon-to-be home. A week from today, I’ll be handed the keys to our new home and Gabe and I will carry box after box up to the second and third floors of a home that the boys and I will share for the next year. We are a week away from our new life.

And the harder that I push my eyelids closed and remind myself that I need sleep, the more evasive it becomes. And time ticks by – one hippopotamus, two hippopotamus, three…