Today is the last day of school for the kids before their Christmas break, that glorious in limbo time when reality seems to stop for a weeks.  No alarm clocks. No homework. No scheduled lunches and tests.

It’s been a while since I was in school myself, but I can’t help but feel that I’m also entering my own brief period of suspended reality before a whole new chapter begins.  New work life.  New adventures.  New month and new year.

But first, closing the old.

I’m saying goodbye to the job that brought me here. I’ve worked for Adam for a little more than three years now and it’s strange to imagine not having the safety net of a salary or the obligation of a boss – even one who lets me do pretty much whatever I want.  I’ll be completely on my own financially in exchange for the freedom to spend my time however I see fit.

To be honest, I haven’t been needed in that job for some time now, so this is just the final stage of what has been a long, slow goodbye.  There’s a sense of relief that comes from the arrival of an end that’s been long coming.

We’re saying goodbye to our stuff. We’ve allowed ourselves the holidays to procrastinate the actual selling off of our belongings, but January marks the beginning of our new way of life.  We’ll be actively getting rid of our stuff and shopping for the RV.  Shit just go real. Or at least, it will, once the calendar flips to 2011.  Until then, we’re focusing on the purgatory of these last weeks of 2010.

I keep looking at the life we’ve built for ourselves and the changes that led to us looking at it all and going, “yeah, that was nice, we’re done with that now” and it’s mind boggling.  How did I go from the woman who used retail therapy to assure herself she wasn’t still a poor little kid to a wife and mother who wants to give it all up for a sense of freedom?

I’m saying goodbye to this blog.  Kind of. I’m not quitting the Internet or blogging or even this particular blog.  But I no longer need a place to rant or vent or be heard.  I know how to make the people in my life hear me now, a need I didn’t even realize I had until I started blogging.  I’ve learned so much about myself since then.  In fact, it wouldn’t be an exaggeration to say that I’ve learned who I am, in large part, because of this blog.  I will forever be grateful for that.  For you.  Especially for those of you who have been reading since damn near day one.

I’ve floundered in this space over the last several months because I wasn’t really sure what to say anymore once I stopped desperately needing to talk about me.

I have a better idea now of what I want this space to be.  I hope that in 2011 people will have a better idea of what to expect when they come here and that those of us – the writer and the readers – who give up some of our time to this blog will get something just as valuable in return, even if it’s just a little encouragement or inspiration.  What, exactly, will that look like?

It’s not time for that yet.

There will be plenty of time for the new and the future and the changes.

But today I just feel like saying goodbye.

Today is about closure.

And enjoying a few weeks of suspended reality.