My lovely new franchise is making slow progress. In fact, to be painfully honest, it’s making no progress at all.
I have my premises under offer but the landlord is taking a long time to finalise his paperwork 
and so there is nothing happening there. This means I can’t advertise for pupils, buy my desks and computers or start to earn a living. It should be very worrying and disappointing, but in fact I am very calm.
I am confident that the premises will work out well. The landlord seems honest, the agent keeps me up to date with the reason for the lack of progress and I feel really positive about building my new home from home in the place I’ve chosen. I have a secure feeling that God has picked out this place for my business and that I will thrive there.
On a practical level, the wait has done me good. I was very troubled at the start about the whole idea of taking on premises and paying rent and starting this brave new business. We were spending equity from our home here and it seemed like a huge risk.
Now, I have had time to get to know the franchise and its resources. I’ve tried out the finance system, got to know the other franchisees and seen people support each other through hassles. I feel cautiously confident that I will be able to make ends meet pretty soon after opening, and can even imagine making a decent living in time.
Perhaps more importantly, I have had to rest. I left my full time teaching job at the end of April and it’s now September. I’ve had some private pupils and a little bit of supply work. I’ve got some rental income from the house I had after my first marriage, so we have some breathing space. And for the first time since I came to live here, at the start of 2017, I have spent days and weeks and even months primarily at home.
For two and a half years, I used to come home from work and see that the gardener had been and mown my lawn. I felt cheated. I wanted to do it. Then I’d notice that the weeds I’d been saving for the tortoise had been weeded out. I felt cross. I needed those weeds! I spent weekends and evenings at home but the time was taken up by domestic chores and my stepson and church, and I was too tired to enjoy anything.
Now, I am pruning and planting and mowing and redesigning in my garden. 
I am rearranging and decorating and altering curtains and baking and framing pictures in my house. 
I am meeting friends and realising that I know my way around the local area now. Twice in the past three weeks, I have bumped into a friend in the supermarket, something that happened every time I went out in my old life, but that had not yet happened here.
At last, I am starting to feel as though I am really settling here. My sons visit and laugh and joke with my new husband. They understand the foibles of the house and are starting to appreciate the local countryside. I feel needed and appreciated at church and by my friends and I have slept well at night for four months or so. I have not much money, but I have peace and love and hope, and that is so much more important. 