Finish what you start.

After 15 long fought months, Chris has graduated and passed the national registry. He looked at me with *near tears* in his eyes when he found out he had finished everything and said, "I finally finished something."

Wow.
It never occurred to me that he felt like he hadn't...
But it makes sense, I suppose.

Looking back, he took a job as a restaurant manager 'for a short time' to help him pay for the rest of college. It was never the plan for restaurant management to become his career.
He wanted to do something physical, science or biology-related, and/or in the medical world. NOT Restaurant...

7 years and a wife and two kids later...
There my husband sat in the midst of a seemingly never-ending tunnel career which he would never have chosen for himself.
Sadly, he was never able to finish college.
To compound issues, we weren't even really 'making it' financially with a job that took so much of him from us. He was miserable.

My creature-of-habit, never-take-a-chance husband did take a chance in 2008 and applied for the Fire Department posting.

He missed the deadline, and it took the wind out of his sails... almost.
He reapplied 6 months later and began training for the physical agility drills.

For the next 9 months, he went on an up-and-down rollercoaster of disappointment, excitement, nerves, polygraphs, piles of paperwork, personal investigation, and jumping through hoops - all while maintaining his 60 hour work weeks.

At long last, he made the cut and on October 1, 2009 he began the academy.

What he didn't know after 18 months of having an endgoal of 'getting in' to the Department was that the real trials still lay ahead of him.

For the following 15 months, Chris went to school full time and trained and studied nightly. He transformed himself into a man committed to achieving his goal with unshakable dedication. He maintained a concentration and focus on his goal unlike anything I have ever seen.

At last, here we sit, almost 3 years wiser and blessed to be finished.

A new career has begun, but it really feels like that dream that began in my husband's heart, has made him a better man.

He's a man who is proud of his own accomplishment.
He's finished what he started. As an added bonus, the school hours that were a part of the Fire and Paramedic Academy will combine with his previous college hours to give him a completed degree! This is something we were not aware of until a couple of weeks ago. God is so good to go before us and prepare the way.

I have learned a lot from him, my husband. He's a good man. His tenacity to finish inspires me.

We are finishers. We stay the course God has put us on. Come what may, with God's help, we will finish.