(Trying to Be) A Good Team in Transition

It’s been wonderful having our older son home with us for a couple of weeks, just in time for the NBA playoffs.  I love joining him in front of the TV, partly just to be with him and partly because he’s kind to me when I ask him basketball questions.  Recently I learned more about the bank shot (a jump shot that goes in off the backboard – embarrassing unless you call it first), about the foolishness of fouling a three-point shooter, and about how advantageous it is to be a good team “in transition.”  On the basketball court, transition is all about the constant back and forth between offense and defense:  the Miami Heat are so successful, my son tells me, in large part because of how fast they can switch gears and set up going the other way.

Since my husband’s election to the episcopate (how do you like that word?) we have been a family preparing for a different kind of transition – one that only partly resembles a fast break.

Moving a family of five from one state to another is no small thing, and we’re taking some time to contemplate it before any wheels are set in motion.  At the moment, it feels more like we’re pensively looking over a chess board than squeaking our high-tops on a basketball court – aware that each decision about how and where and even when to move will likely bring about other significant effects on our lives.  We know the starting date for my husband’s new position, and we know where his office will be — but not a whole lot else…yet.

We were fortunate to be able to take some time away on an ocean beach (thanks to a parishioner generously offering her home) over the past several days.  What we got was both a break from the throbbing pace of life over the past month and a chance to approach the whole transition issue in spurts of conversation during which each family member’s voice could be heard.  This was good and healthy, and also not so easy.   Much like change itself.

It was after one of these discussions during a dinner out, as we drove back to the place where we were staying, that I spotted a modest sign on the side of the road, with the words “Quality Transitions Inc.” on it.  What?  Could these people, whoever they were, be equipped to help our family through the re-location challenges in the coming months?  Was this a sign like an actor might see in a movie, providing promise of a needed resource at exactly the right time?  Wishful thinking.  When I went back to examine the thing more closely, I saw that the business was all about human resources – helping people to find the right jobs and companies to find the right employees.  That’s all fine and good, but I guess it meant that nobody’s shingle hanging by a driveway was likely to sweep us through our particular transition without some effort on our part.

On the way home yesterday, looking forward to watching another playoff game with my son, my mind started coursing through some other kinds of transitions I’d experienced, either as a participant or as a kind of bystander or cheerer-on.

Some years ago, I helped to administer a welfare-to-work program in Connecticut, serving people who collected benefits from, and were beholden to, the Department of Social Services.  Although another “T” word – “Temporary”—was used to describe the kind of assistance the state offered to the unemployed, I see that Massachusetts provides the same kind of help through its Department of Transitional Assistance.  The website says that various programs (serving a whopping 1-out-of-8 state residents) give people “a bridge to success.”  I bet lots of people not receiving benefits these days wish they could find that bridge, too.

In my English classes, I often broach the topic of transitions in essay writing.  For some reason, teenagers don’t always see why it’s important to guide a reader gently from one topic to another without a jolt, often finding it perfectly acceptable to provide a verbal experience not unlike going through a lock on a canal.

Speaking of canals, there is of course the kind of transition that many of us women experienced about as directly as you can get –when we gave birth.  In case you forget (or perhaps never had the pleasure) it’s the last part of the “active labor” stage.  Don’t worry – I won’t go into detail here.  Suffice it to say that it’s a version of transition that takes plenty of attention.  And has been known to produce some pretty decent results.

The thing is, when you start identifying particular kinds of transitions, you inevitably begin to wonder which times in life are definitely, absolutely not transitions.  Aren’t we always, in some way, trying to get from a here to a there?  Sometimes “there” might be just to the next paragraph; other times it might be down the court to the right basket, or maybe to a new job or even a new baby.

Even though I can’t stand when a noun gets used an as adjective, it looks like I’ll need to launch my own kind of “quality transition” business in the coming weeks.  Better lace up my sneakers and stay agile.