A Final Look at Summer

Where does the time go? It seems as though it was only yesterday that I was sitting in my comfy chair typing out a post on how dreary spring was ... and now we're on the cusp of Fall! Summer is my favorite in New England. The weather is mostly glorious, beaches are everywhere, and we pretty much get to spend all of our days outside. By the time winter is really over around here, summer is well deserved ... and this year we vowed to soak up every moment of sunshine we can.

We did a lot of biking. Around playgrounds, campgrounds, rail trails, driveways ... just about anywhere we could bike, we did.

We learned how to pitch a tent. And we camped all over Cape Cod. 

We found our favorite beach. And drank a lot of Ningxia Red.

We found our favorite town in New England. And we went there at least once a week - sometimes twice - to make sure we really did love it as much as we thought we did. We talked to people, we tried out restaurants, we rode bikes, we went to the library. We drove by houses on the market in our price range. We went to Open Houses. We fell in love. Over and over and over again.

So we decided to sell our house.

The girls and I flew to Georgia to spend some time with family and D stayed in New England to get the house on the market. The plan worked. We were under contract before we even came home. It was, quite possibly, the most stressful and hardest two weeks of the summer. But in the end, the right decision. And it was SO good to see all the cousins play together. That just doesn't happen often enough.

We came home at peak harvest season. So we shucked a lot of corn. Over 100 ears to be exact. And it's still coming. I've now resorted to giving some to friends each week. 

We ended our summer with one final camping trip. This time to Maine with our best buddies. We found Grant Park. And hiked (a little bit) around Acadia National Park. We fell in love with New England a little bit harder, and decided Acadia would be a place we went back to again next year. This time for longer than just a day.

We said farewell to Walden Pond. The place that made us initially think that maybe life in New England wasn't so bad after all.

And in the final weeks of summer, we found a house in our new beloved town, we gave more hugs and cherished more moments together as we prepared to send the oldest off to Kindergarten.

The Summer of 2017 .... it has been the most fun summer I can ever remember as a little family of four. And perhaps the most life changing as well. Here's to new beginnings!

On Being Deeply Rooted

I am one of those people that is deeply grateful for the season of Lent. It comes at just the right time every year … when I’m feeling over the cold winter months and ready for the light and warmth of Spring. It is a time for reflection. For mindfulness. For purpose. And in these final months of winter, I’m in desperate need of all of these things.

Ash Wednesday is two days away, but I’m already getting a start on my Lenten journey. A friend introduced me to this book yesterday and I knew, just from reading the sample, that it is exactly what I need in this season of my life. The Introduction brought me to tears within the first few pages.

This happens to us all at some point. A crisis hits like a storm. Divorce. Death. Loss. Our stories differ, but the fallout is the same: we lose sight of who we are.

We become unrecognizable. And so we struggle to regain our footing, to find our place, to feel secure in who we are.

But no matter how we grab for a sense of significance, it remains out of reach. We’re not sure who we are anymore, and we haven’t a clue where to find the answer.

Sound familiar? What was the last crisis in your life?

Nine years ago, I lost my job as an attorney. I can remember the moment my boss let me go as if it was yesterday. “You’re doing great work, but I just can’t afford to pay you any longer.” I had a wonderful relationship with her, and she will always have a very special place in my heart. Between sobs in her office, as she was calling to get me set up for unemployment compensation, I replied, “I think you just answered a prayer. I think God has been trying to tell me something, and I wasn’t listening. And I think you just provided a big ole’ smack on the head.”

And then, just a few months later, I left my first marriage. Although I knew it was absolutely the right decision, not only for me, but for my ex-husband as well, it was one of the hardest decisions I ever made. Not because of the loss, because if I’m really honest, being out felt more like a huge gain than anything else. But because of the shame. I was only 27 years old, and already I had a big fat “Divorce” next to my name. How would anyone ever trust me again? How would I ever come back from that moment to live a full life?

One of the best things that came from those crises was that I spent intentional time in Bible reading, prayer, and writing. I would sit on my small twin bed in my tiny apartment and read, and write, and cry. I would call out for God to hold me and make his presence known. For the first time in my life, although I was deeply alone, I never felt lonely.

That was the biggest crisis of my life. And yet it was the time when I felt the most rooted in my faith.

Fast forward 8 years. I was feeling wonderfully secure. I had a house that I loved. A one-of-a-kind neighborhood where I always dreamed of living, but never expected that I actually would. I had a community of neighbors and friends that truly taught me how to be a parent. I learned so much there. How to be a neighbor. How to care for people. How to parent simply. How to live purposefully. How to eat (and cook) real food. I never dreamed I would leave.

And then we did. We sold our house, we packed up our things, and we moved over 1000 miles away. We did it because D got a job offer we couldn’t refuse. We did it because Massachusetts is, in so many ways, such a better place to raise children. We did it because we knew it was the right thing for us as a family.

But man … did it shake my world. I realized, when I read this passage yesterday, that this was my most recent crisis. My identity was wrapped up in Grant Park. I was a parent. A wife. A neighbor. I was a friend. A cook. A provider. A creator. And since that moment when we last drove away from that dear beloved house … I am just not sure who I am anymore. I have become unrecognizable. I have struggled to regain my footing. To find my place. To feel secure in who I am.

So this Lent, I’m digging deep to find my roots. I’m going to use this gift of a season to really become rooted once again. I’m going to be intentional about reading, praying, and writing. I’m sure there will be a lot of crying. Maybe even some weeping. But I know, at the end of this journey, I’ll look back and say “That was one of the most formative times in my life.”

On Wandering

Today is one of those days when I'm hating it here. Not necessarily New England here … but this little rural place we find ourselves in. It comes in waves - this feeling of isolation and separation. We knew when we bought out here we would have a very different life than the one we were used to. And with every house purchase comes some kind of sacrifice. This time we sacrificed location so that we could have affordability, and space, and outdoor space to play. But man … some days that sacrifice seems almost too much to bear. Some days the sacrifice just doesn't seem worth it.

Some days I would rather have a smallish condo with very little outdoor space so that I can walk outside and be in the hustle bustle right away. But even those places are hard to find in our price range. At least for a price that doesn't feel financially irresponsible. I could go on and on about my disgust over the Boston-area house market … but that’s for another day - another post.

I'm not sure there is ever a day that I truly love it here. I do love our house … I dearly love our house. I even love our mess of a yard. But when it comes right down to it … I don't totally love its location. There are days when I allow myself to like it. I like that we are close to the commuter rail. I like that we are close to Concord - without the Concord prices. Some days, I like to pretend it's a retreat center. A quiet place away from the hustle and bustle of everyday life. I mean - once I’m home - I do love it. It’s when I head out for a walk that I get frustrated at the ruralness of this place.

So I try to convince myself that we will rise up out of this rut. We just need time to adjust. In time, we will learn to love the feeling of living in the middle of nowhere. We'll learn to love the fact that there's nothing around you. We’ll start growing our own food, and we’ll create a safe haven here in this place - not just for us, but for everyone we know. We'll adapt to a life of mindfulness - and truly appreciate the beauty of the simple.

But some days I just long for hustle bustle. I long for people all around me - for human connection, for art museums, for live music, for a front porch, for my old life.

Sometimes I just want to curse that old neighborhood of mine. It wasn't perfect - we actually can't imagine ever moving back - but damn we had some good memories there. And damn it was easy to connect with people. At least a hell of a lot easier than here.

It's funny - because that old neighborhood wasn't really any more walkable than where we are now. Sure, we could walk around the park, and we could walk to friends’ houses, but it's not like we could walk to get a gallon of milk. Or to a farm for fresh produce.

But we could walk to the zoo. The splash pad!! We could walk to get ice cream - or a good cup of coffee. We could walk to our chiropractor, and to the library, and to a pool.

It’s a give and take, this big move of ours. In just 9 months - has it been that long already?! In just 9 months, we’ve made connections and community here in a way that we always longed for while we lived in Atlanta. We’ve found a church to call home … in a way that we haven’t had since we left Resurrection 5 years ago. We’ve made a life-lasting friendship with a family that is far greater than any friendship we’ve ever had … as long as we’ve been a family. David is flourishing in his job in a way that has never happened before. I have stepped out on a ledge in temporarily going back to work - and trying to build a new business - while planning to homeschool and making a home … all at the same time. We can bike to the train station - to the library - to the playground. Heck, we can walk there if we really want to ... it just takes a little bit longer.

Our hearts are so full of love and joy here - and yet some days there’s still a tiny bit of wandering happening.

Just a few weeks ago I heard a sermon at church that really struck a chord with me. Our pastor was talking about homesickness … and how there are times in our lives when we long for the past. But we aren’t really longing for the past because it was so great … we long for the past because it’s what we know. And if we really dig deep within our hearts, we realize that it’s not the past we are longing for at all. Instead, we are yearning for something greater - we are yearning for something which we haven’t experienced yet.

I know that's so true for us here. We are longing for something greater than we've ever had. That's the reason we moved here. We've begun to experience that in small ways - and I know greater things are still yet to come.

Photo Credit

God is Here

Spring is upon us here in Massachusetts, and I couldn't be more excited about it. Good old Mother Nature treated us to a snow storm yesterday, but as I stare out the window now, almost all of the 4-5 inches we got are melted already. We are seeing green sprout up from the ground and the sun is feeling warmer and warmer every single day. I'm so ready to be able to explore the great outdoors - without having to bundle up.

We are really loving living here ... and can't imagine ever moving back to GA - but there are still days when I feel really lonely. I was talking with another older woman on Sunday who moved her family a across few states when she was my age. She said she remembers feeling so isolated, like a trip to the grocery store was so important to her because she actually saw people - real live adults - there. I nodded my head in agreement. Some weeks I'm lucky if I see a real live adult other than my husband. I didn't realize how connected to people we were in Atlanta, until we moved here and became so disconnected.

We try to have a play date once a week with a family from church, but we had a week of sickness, a week of visitors, another week of sickness, and now they have a visitor, so we've only seen them a couple of times this month. And although we've found a church to call home, we have found it very hard to plugin to do anything more than Sunday worship.

And if we are really honest with ourselves, more often than not, it still feels like we're wandering. We have been here almost four months now, but we are only slightly more settled. Admittedly, those four months have been packed full of (mostly negative) excitement and transitions. We have one more planned transition - the move to our house in May - and then I told my husband I don't want to ever move again. We are hoping that once we move in, we will start to feel like this is it. Like we've planted our roots and are ready to grow and flourish. We can plant flowers - and vegetables - and we'll have an outdoor space to call our own. We spent so much time in our outdoor space in Grant Park, and are really looking forward to having a yard that will allow us to spend a lot of time outside. A friend of mine in Atlanta told me once you have owned your own space, going back to renting is so difficult - and that has been so true for us here.

I have a framed watercolor print hanging above my desk with a quote from Sarah Bessey's latest book that says,

God is here in the wandering.

It's my reminder that no matter how isolated we feel, God is there. A reminder that we will not be wandering forever - or at least not in the same sense of being "between homes." A reminder that God is providing for us - every single step of the way.

Photo Credit

Finding Our Groove

All of a sudden we find ourselves in the second half of January. Our first six weeks in New England have been difficult - we've faced a terrible cold, followed by an incredibly long bout of the norovirus. We've experienced much emotional heartbreak over leaving our home and we've been struggling with our landlord over the state of our apartment. We've driven around to so many little towns where we think we can afford to purchase a home, made two offers on houses - neither of which worked out, and 95% of the time we end up feeling defeated. We are still not sure what our purpose is here yet ... but we are pretty damn confident God's in control of the situation.

This moving across country thing ... it's no joke. Especially when you have a family in tow. But there have been glimpses of hope. In fact, every single time we get down and out, God seems to throw us a tiny little light. It's as if God is saying, Stay the course. I will reveal it to you when the time is right. Just trust me. There's something theologically profound about the fact that we are living this beginning part of our journey in the seasons of Advent, Christmas, and Epiphany. The season of waiting - the season of immense joy that the Messiah has come - and then the season of more waiting. Waiting for that Messiah to really show himself and God's purpose and glory.

So the last few weeks I've been trying to keep my eyes open to the epiphanies. To those moments that God chooses to reveal a tiny glimpse of what might be in store for us. 

The weather has been beautiful, and we've only just experienced our first REAL snow and biting cold this past weekend. Just last week the girls and I managed to bundle up and walk the mile to our new chiropractor to get adjusted - even though the high was 29 and the wind made it feel like 15. Never in a million years did I think I would be outside with temperatures that low. But the sun was out and the reflection on the snow was oh so beautiful. And when we got home, we warmed up with hot drinks - apple cider for the girls and an essential oil tea for me.

We have found a church that we like, and although it's not completely what we ever hoped for or dreamed of (I mean - is there ever a place like that?), it is definitely the right place for us right now. It's full of families, they commune children whenever parents deem them to be ready, there's a children's sermon during the service, they don't mind that my children worship with us and dance to every song we sing, there's a women's book club that meets on Saturdays, and although we aren't completely happy with every aspect of it, our kids LOVE it ... and that is a huge deal for us.

There are SO MANY farms up here. The fresh food options are incredible, even in the bitter cold of January. As a family who really values local real food, we are so very pleased at the ease of eating healthy. Even the grocery stores here have better options than we had in Atlanta.

And on Sunday, when I was feeling at my what may have been my lowest point since moving here, I found myself having a conversation with another stay-at-home mom (I was beginning to think they didn't exist here)! I had cried on the way to church, fighting with God over what in the hell we are doing here, and then there she was. She has two children close in age to my own and - what do you know - is from East Tennessee and went to college in Atlanta. At the end of the conversation she gave me her phone number, and suggested we get together. I don't know if she knew what an answer to a prayer she was in that very moment.

So here we are, in the second half of January, finally finding our groove and making new routine. We're finally creating our new normal, and beginning to feel like this place is home. Although I still miss Atlanta and my people dearly, I'm finding that I actually can't imagine moving back. And when I take a step back and look at how far we've come in the last six weeks, I can see a little more clearly that God is here ... in our wandering ... every single step of the way.