January 8, 2006

January 8
Jesse, my son, goes back to school tomorrow. He's had off for three weeks of Christmas break so he has been around for the entire move. His behavior and sweet composure through it all have been amazing to me. Even so, being able to get out of the house by myself during the day will allow me to get a lot accomplished that I wouldn't attempt with him in tow.
I find that so many things are scary to me that wouldn't cause most people to blink. I'm very inexperienced and ignorant on a lot of fronts for a couple of reasons. First, all the while I was growing up and even through most of the first ten years of my marriage I was very shy. I'm talking about the crippling kind of shyness that makes even going to a Bible study or returning something defective to a store feel like a trauma. As I got older the shyness has faded away. Second, my husband's illness was such that he needed to handle every detail. He worried, he obsessed, he micromanaged. Even though at times he felt overwhelmed that he took care of all the business in the family, the minute I would attempt to make a decision or take over a task he would be right there managing and double-checking to the point where it was all pointless. I've an internal distaste for business anyway, so I admit I never fought his unilateral take-over hard enough.
But now I am suddenly on my own. It isn't only a matter of paying the bills either. I'm cutting my business teeth on buying and selling major pieces of property and hiring contractors for various tasks. Tomorrow I must do a major piece of banking...depositing the money from the sale of the house, wiring money back to my sister, getting everything switched over from my husband's name to mine alone and changing my address on everything. I'm beginning to trust "them" to guide me through all the steps. It's their job. But merely dealing with strangers to this extent still produces a sort of low-level anxiety in me. The bottom line is I think I am afraid of seeming like a forty-four-year-old idiot. Why do we have such a dread of a bit of hurt pride before people we don't even know? What is that? Why can't I just walk into a bank or an insurance office and say, "I have no idea what I'm doing. Please help me."? Maybe I'll try that and see what happens.