When God closes a door he opens a window.....for real?

I hate that saying. It's one of those sayings people use when they are in a "happy-go-lucky" place and you are wallorin' like a pig in slop.

In my life God closing the door has never been a pretty sight and usually plays itself out something like this.
The door is usually one I enjoy using thus the reason I keep using it. So when it slams I begin knocking on it and jiggling the knob to see if it's really locked or if the wind just blew it shut. In pure frustration, I pound on it, maybe kick it a few times. Finally, after waiting much longer than I should, I plop down on the floor beside it. As for finding the open window, I'm not ready for that yet.
I proceed to spend a considerable amount of time trying to figure out why the door shut. I ask God what I did wrong? How could I have prevented it? Then on to the "why is this happening to me" line of thinking.
Even then I don't look for the open window. I wander around pounding on the wall to see if I can make my own door. As for the open window.....well it usually has to just suck me right through it.

Consequently this spring, when the door that I had used for several years unexpectedly, yet firmly shut, I began to go through that whole door/window process. Because I am now little older and a tiny bit wiser, I passed through the various stages a little quicker than in the past. And presto chango, here I am, through the window and on the threshold of a very new and different life.

This "window" actually began being built six years ago when my husband radically changed his profession and moved from being a general contractor into cardiac surgical nursing. The process of his going back to school at middle age and me becoming the sole breadwinner was far from easy. After living in a home that was 3500 square feet suddenly we were living in an efficiency apartment over a woman's 2-car garage. Yet another hairpin turn. One of the ideas that encouraged us during this time was the opportunity to see the country, and possibly the world, through travel nursing. (Doesn't that sound vaguely like what they used to tell people at the army recruiting office?)

Travel nursing is a bit of a vagabond lifestyle. You travel the country helping to fill the nursing shortage in a series of 13 week assignments. We saw that as an opportunity to experience a slice of life in different areas without having to make a permanent commitment. It would provide us with just a taste, not the full meal deal.

When my own professional door closed, the window led us back to this idea of travel nursing. And, lo and behold, that's where we are, our "life" in storage, ready to head out west for the first assignment.