So Many Questions

I used to work with kids. Initially just during a few months in the Winter but it soon turned into a year round adventure. I used to feel that it was something that I was being called to do. I thought that it was important work and I sometimes feel badly that I don't do it anymore. You reach an age eventually where you wonder if you lose credibility. Just a feeling that it's work for someone who's closer to the kids age. You certainly reach an age where you begin to lose energy and even the passion. All the extra hours (besides your regular job) in sometimes less than ideal weather conditions and fears of not living up to certain expectations can wear a person down to the point where I literally get chills now when just thinking about it.

I wonder if the fact that I have no desire anymore ..... if it's a sin? I did what I could, at a point in life when I was able. Was that enough? I used to wonder how I would know when it was time to walk away? Just like I still wonder with my regular job. I used to think that it would be impossible for me to knowingly walk away one day for the final time. I did make a decision to take a step back for a couple months, into a lesser role in a time of so many uncertainties about the programs themselves. It was just a month or two later when long rumoured budget cuts, ended it all. While I may have sensed it, I didn't actually know on the last day that I walked away from a youth soccer field, that it was really the final day. There was no official notice. As I recall I read about the end of youth programs in the newspaper.

It still feels a little odd. There was no exit paperwork. No pink slip. No goodbyes. It was like it all never existed. Like it all vanished into thin air. Like thirty years of service meant nothing. (Though I've run into enough people around town over the years to know that it meant quite a bit to a lot of people.) I used to wonder if the first step undertaken after the news of the programs demise was to change the after hours access code to get into the office. I never knew because I never returned.

To this day, I get chills when driving or walking by where the office used to be. The same emotions would likely come out if I ever passed by certain schools, gyms, baseball or soccer fields where I once spent so much time and effort but I have no reason these days to go near those places. Few are on my normal travel routes around town. Occasionally I'll think to myself that I should pass by just to see what's going on but each time I fail to follow-up. Just can't do it!! It's a little like driving by the house that you grew up in. Too painful.