Taking Time

I know I haven't yet posted my reflections on the Albania trip. That's partly because we have been very busy, and partly because I am still trying to be ok with being back here. This week I hope to have time to write some of my thoughts and feelings about the trip and our experiences. For today, though, I want to share about our yesterday.

One of the areas that the Lord has really been working in me is to be able to relax and just enjoy time with people. I have a tendency to either think about things that I should be doing instead of just sitting around talking, or I think about how much I don't belong in whatever group I am with and that maybe they would have more fun without me. Neither of those things is healthy. They both take away from my ability to enjoy people and their ability to really know me, which, like my pastor says, is robbing people of relationship.

For those of you who don't know what our month has been like, here's a quick recap: The weekend of the 4th of July, Mark & I took the kids to Wisconsin to spend three weeks with my parents. We drove the 36 hour round trip in 3 1/2 days. Four days later I left for 10 days in Albania. Three days after getting back from Albania, we left to drive back to Wisconsin to pick up the kids. We got there Friday night and had to leave Saturday morning to drive back to Tennessee.

My grandma has been ill, and I really wanted to see her on this trip. In order to do that, though, we added about 5 hours of drive time to an already long trip. We needed to leave my parent's house first thing in the morning to make that visit and drive a good part of the way back to Tennessee. My niece, who I haven't seen in years, invited us to breakfast on our way out of town. We left two hours later than my goal, but we had such a great time eating breakfast with her and meeting her fiancee.

We then drove over to Minnesota to see my grandma. On the way, we realized that our new route home would take us very close to our best friends from college. We also knew that stopping there would put us way behind schedule. We just couldn't be that close without at least calling them, though, so we did. They were so excited, and we made plans to eat dinner with them.

We got to grandma's about 2, and visited with her for an hour & a half. It was such a special time. The kids talked with her and spent some time playing outside. I shared my Albania pictures with her, and Mark took some pictures. It was worth every bit of driving out of our way just to have that time with her.


We left grandma's and drove down to the cities to see Kari & Greg. I love watching how easily our kids mix and play together, even though they hardly ever get to see each other. Mark & Greg headed out to the grill to hang out. We didn't have to worry about whether they would have anything to talk about like wives often do. When they left, Kari said, "Ok, you've been here at least 5 minutes. How's your marriage?" No small talk necessary. We could just jump into the important heart stuff, because no matter the distance, that connection is always there. We spent 3 hours at their house eating, talking and enjoying our kids together. I wouldn't trade that time for any number of miles behind us.


The funny thing is, we found a new way back to Tennessee from their house that is actually about 2 hours shorter than any way we've driven before. I sit in a hotel room in Iowa, 7 hours from Jackson, and realize that the time we spent with people yesterday was so much more important than anything else we could have done. And I am thankful for the lessons God teaches me in preparation for times like that.