19 days

Molly and me

i have promised to be open and candid and honest and frequent in writing. i don't have internet at the cabin so that is my excuse. i spent six days with laura in kansas and didn't want to leave. john kept the kids and we got to go out on the town. we picked the nicest restaurant in town and were headed that way but stopped by Wal-Mart first. i started to think about the long lines, overpriced appetizers, electric ambience and asked Laura if we could just go to the Outback Steakhouse across the street instead. i have had many a nice meal and really just wanted to sit across from her and soak up this time together, undistracted. we have never even lived in the same time zone but i am going to miss her deeply. she knows everything about me. there have been seasons when we talk every single day. when john was deployed she called me every night for a year, almost. she would always call after the kids were in bed and she was an hour behind so the hour was always late for me. she would usually make me laugh so hard i would have trouble falling asleep. i was in her wedding. i was one of the first people to see molly ann steen make her debut on this earth. i can give up a lot of things and make large sacrifices but this relationship is one of my dearest possessions. i vividly remember parents of missionaries coming over to Papa Davis' to use the Ham Radio to talk to their daughter in some remote country every Sunday afternoon. i am grateful for Skype and email and texting. i pray that this time draws us closer and i can be the sounding board, confidant and friend that she is to me.

i am having to eat all my words and repent of all the unkind things i ever said about my little hometown. this place is lovely. i sat in "traffic" yesterday on my way "home" from lunch with a beautiful friend. i watched as all the buses pulled out on the main drag coming from the middle school and high school. i had flashbacks of what it felt like for the school bell to ring. i could not wait to get home. school was a huge part of my life and i remember much of it, but i lived for the bell to ring. it is football weather here right now and i have the window open. the air is cool and crisp. when we lived on college avenue i could hear the band rehearsing before the game on friday night in our backyard. snare drums and trumpet serenading me as i shot hoops on my black dirt court waiting on my dad to come shoot with me. in our neighborhood in hartwell, i knew every side road, every crack in the sidewalk and covered them hundreds of times over on my aqua blue Schwinn. i loved riding by the cat house. a white house with a large screened in porch where multiple cats lounged against the screens. there was the house on the corner with the spitting frog. all the schools were within walking distance of my house. i came home every day to a house full of cute little toddlers dressed in Oshkosh and Keds eating goldfish and drinking from Tupperware sippy cups. 

now i am back here for a short, short while and this community has embraced me and treated me like royalty. i had the pleasure of growing up in this community and was allowed to be myself and told i could be and do anything i wanted in life. i was constantly encouraged and given so many opportunities in this small town. i picked at random and did as much as i could; forestry and 4-H, community theater, methodist youth, tennis, and a very impressive basketball career, to name a few. now that i am back here i am finding those same people here cheering me on. they are proud of me and they mean it. they love me and they mean it. they pray for me, out loud. this community is a great gift. the church community across denominational lines has embraced me and given me their pulpits to share my little story. they have written me checks and made sacrifices just to give into me and what i am doing. not to mention i am living in the prettiest house in town. linen curtains, Stickley furniture, seagrass flooring, and a shower big enough for all of us. it is quite the contrast from here to where i am going, where i am told i get a bed and a plastic chair, for which i am grateful.

i keep walking by the two duffle bags that will in 19 days hold all my personal belongings and each time i just sigh and give up and walk away. it is too much to think about. if i had to leave in an hour it would all be there and i would have all i need. i have been preparing for this for a very long time.

 recent trip to SC to see the cousins, McCarley and me

i have my last Portuguese class on Monday and dinner with my favorite somewhere-in-a-foreign-land missionaries who are home on furlough. then on Tuesday i meet with the Portuguese language teacher in Atlanta about getting curriculum for our students in Pemba!! it's going to be great. every single day is full and these next weeks are going to fly by. pray for peace and rest, for me. and know that i am praying for all of you too. i have put all your names, donors and prayer warriors and supporters and friends down in my spiral notebook so i can carry you along with me and lift you up too.