Patience

While I prepared to make the Big Decision, I made many lists.
Pros and Cons assembled over months, daily schedules, curriculum thoughts,
wish list of what we'd study, cons broken down into area of concern.
There was the social aspect, the friendship issue, keeping up with grade level, all the general
concerns that revolve around removing a child from the traditional school setting.

There was one list I never made. My cons.

I knew that my son and I had a working relationship in that,
He is good-natured enough to sit down to instruction. We have slaved
through (and more often than not - as of late-  enjoyed) three years of violin lessons and practicing. I knew with a reasonable certainty that our teacher/student relationship had been ironed out. (More like, warm iron, no starch, no steam kind of ironed. Better than a mess right out of the dryer, at least.)

But, could I take it? I might have a slight reputation for losing my temper with him. It is the struggle and agony of my life so far. My passion for everything else - let loose when things get on the wrong side of my control, my comfort, my agenda. I never listed this anywhere, even though I knew it to be the most significant obstacle in making homeschooling feasible. In my defense, he can be really irritating.

It is here where homeschooling became not just a leap of faith but a base jump into the fathomless pit of my anger. I think that this is why the first day, the first hours, were the worst. How can I limit my son's daily life to our home, knowing that when things get heated with him, I can get mad?

In all the ways that homeschooling have been easier, there is one way that it has been hard. I have been yanked out of contentment with small changes and forced to pursue deeper, authentic change.

The comfort is that after a morning involving some yelling and at the end of myself, I found, like one of those pools cave jumpers find a thousand feet down in the pitch black, the grace of God for today. More real than I have ever experienced it. Real enough to touch and taste and get up and ask for forgiveness and go on. Forward because I know only one thing for sure: there will be enough grace down there tomorrow.