The day the lock turned with no resistance

Today I left the house and the lock turned and didn't stick at all when I locked it.  That has NEVER happened to me; not once anytime I've ever locked the door these 3 months.  And earlier this week I locked the door without thinking and was halfway down the street before I realized I had done it.  I actually walked back to make sure I really had locked the door.  Why is she babbling about locking doors you might ask? Well if you remember one of my first blogs when I got here you'll remember the picture from my very first night in Belfast when I couldn't lock the door.

Its the small things that have stuck out to me the most while here.  Often some of the smallest things have been the most difficult, like locking a door.  Many of these small things I can now do without resistance and without thinking.  Its also in the small things that I tend to find the most joy.  The small joys that make me able to get through the really hard stuff.  Things like hearing that the kids from youth club asked about me by name when I wasn't there (granted they use the name Crystal which has been made up for me, but a name I have begun responding to nonetheless.  It shows they really know me and have some surprise when I'm not around), knowing that we have truly become a community when someone lends a hand to pick me up out of the mud and laughs at the end of the game and says the mud is because I rocked out some touch football and not because I fell on my butt, knowing I'm doing a good job because I am assigned a new responsibility which that person had no intention of giving to me but decided to because she trusts me to do it, or merely seeing someone randomly around town in a place I never expected to see them.  The small things are what really show me that I'm doing something right, that I fit in, that I am in the place I am meant to be.  The key is really starting to turn without thought or resistance; I'm finding my routine, my place.