I loved Sunday School when I was a child. Felt boards with figures of Bible characters were how I remember learning the stories of the good book, watching the sweet grandmotherly women manipulate these flat figures as they narrated the tales of Old Testament and New. And the puppets! Big mouth puppets made of felt with fuzzy acrylic or yarn hair that led us in church songs like “Blue Skies and Rainbows” or “Roll the Gospel Chariot.” I loved Sunday School, I really did. There was a story that always puzzled me, though, and that was the story of Lot’s wife.
You may not know this one: God has decided to destroy Sodom and Gomorrah because of its evil, and one Godly man remains. Lot and his family have been warned to flee the impending disaster and NOT TO LOOK BACK AS THEY LEAVE.
But Lot’s wife does. And God turns her into a pillar of salt. A freaking pillar of salt! As a child, I just didn’t understand why God would choose such a harsh punishment for simply wanting one last glance back at one’s home. The twin cities were corrupt and toxic, yes, but they were also familiar. They were home. I don’t know that I understood this until recently.
Let me explain:
I recently left my twenty year teaching career. I hadn’t really planned to. I finished my Master’s degree in my field (Theatre), I thought I had turned the corner on what had been an extremely difficult transition with a new principal, I had started the preparations for the coming school year’s production schedule. We had even started making the costumes for the planned fall production: a steampunk version of “The Wizard of Oz.”
Boom! On a Friday afternoon, upon arriving home from a week teaching drama camp, I learned that a position that I had been coveting for three years had magically become available: to be the School Days Coordinator for the Texas Renaissance Festival, the largest renaissance faire in the country, a faire I had worked at for fifteen years as an entertainer.
I struggled with the decision for about ten days, then took a deep breath and resigned my teaching position. And ever since, I find myself looking back over my shoulder, wondering if I made the right choice, fretting that my replacement would not take good care of my program, at moments desperately missing those great core theatre kids, and sometimes wishing for the chance to direct something.
It’s crippling, really.
In moments of clarity, I remember that I felt like I was slowly suffocating from the workload.
I remember that for every wonderful kid who smiled and tried, there were four who spoke rudely or whose apathy was a line drawn in the ground of the battlefield that is the classroom.
I remember that my administration treated me like a child.
I remember that my voice was ragged, and my own creative endeavors outside of school nonexistent.
It was toxic. Maybe not always, and maybe not for everyone, but for me, my school and career had become a poisoned place.
I think the Divine One knows that to look back can hinder you until you carry that misery forward into the new life He has laid out in front of you. She knows it to the tune of salt. It is as though He refuses to allow you to carry that forward. It will keep those with you from travelling forward as they should. I don’t know why God chose such a drastic means of chastening Lot’s wife, but I am trying to remember that I do not want to become my own living salt statue, inert and crumbling, unable to connect with my husband, kids, or friends.
I need to let go, and look forward to the blessings that await me on this new path:
Golf cart rides with my husband out on the verdant grounds of the renaissance festival, a renewed singing voice, time to write, respect from my boss, and work that is challenging on a large scale.
Walking away does not make me a loser. Setting down a burden that is smothering is not a failure. Life is not only struggle, it is release.
Note: I was searching through my drafts and found this one. This very week marks one year since I started my new job. My replacement took good, if disorganized, care of my students. I still miss teaching, but I am getting better at looking ahead and dreaming of what possibilities might lie ahead.
Kimberly Bryant, MA 