Crossing the Ocean

"The place God calls us to is the place where your deep gladness and the world's deep hunger meet."

-Frederick Beuchner

I blame Disney for my inability to take the easy path in life.  I’m pretty sure I saw Beauty and the Beast in the theater at least five times (back in the glory days of the dollar theater, of course!).  There’s this scene where Belle is running through a meadow singing at the top of her lungs,

I want adventure in the great wild somewhere,

I want it more than I can tell,

And for once it might be grand,

to have someone understand,

I want so much more than they’ve got planned.

And by “they,” she means the villagers and her father, who all expect her to marry Gaston and settle into the predictable life of being a housewife.  

But not Belle.  She wants adventure, and she doesn’t know where to start.  Conveniently following her little rant, her horse shows up and, in a Lassie-like moment, warns her that her father is in mortal danger and she rides off into the setting sun.  Then some hour and half later there’s a handsome prince and a castle and library and happily ever after.  Yeah.

It’s been nine months since coming home from the epic adventure known as The World Race.  My world was wrecked and opened at the same time.  My heart was broken and made alive all at once.  I felt contentment in simplicity and purpose in the mundane.  It was unlike anything I’ve ever experienced, and quite frankly, it’s difficult to integrate into life back home.  

I titled my blog This New Season.  I came home with new dreams and no plans.  The two hardest questions a Racer faces when coming off the field are 

“How was your trip?”  (Like, how much time do you have?)

and 

“What’s next for you?”  

Fortunately for the planner in me, the next season came quickly and easily.  Within two months, I found myself in a comfortable job that I liked very much.  Despite the fact that I left teaching (and often complained about the fact that, of all things, I couldn’t seem to escape kids’ ministry on the Race), I do love children, and I have fallen in love with the kids I get to work with everyday.  Oh, let’s be honest.  I don’t “work” with them.  We hang out.  

A few weeks after coming home, I moved in with my grandmother, which has been a blast.  She’s a hoot (my favorite grandma quote so far:  “How did she come up with the name Lady Gaga?”)  

I made new friends and have a found a new church that I love.  I began sewing as a way to raise funds for potential long-term missions.  I found a new normal and a new balance.  

But I knew this was a season of transition.  To what and for how long, I wasn’t quite sure.  That answer is now clear.  

Drum roll please. . . 

I am excited (and scared/nervous/hopeful/wishful/petrified) to announce that I will be moving to Gainesville, Georgia this week to begin working in the Admissions department at Adventures in Missions.  

I can honestly say the decision to move was one of the hardest decisions I have ever had to make.  It’s not that I didn’t want the job and the excitement of a new place and all of that.  It’s that I didn’t want to leave behind so much.  

Driving the bus at work the other day, I sort of had an “Oh crap what have I done?” moment, wishing for just a minute that life could stay the way it’s been.  And you know what I realized?  I want to stay because it’s so dang COMFORTABLE.    

Not that comfortable is wrong.  I believe this season has been one of rest for me, and for that I am thankful.  But I am not finding myself particularly challenged, nor have I wandered too far from my comfort zone.  

This is a risky move.  There are many “if’s.”  But I feel like it is the right decision and will help move me closer to where I want to be.  I have more thoughts here.  Maybe later.     

And who knows?  Maybe there’s a prince charming at this end of this story. :)  Holding a puppy.