All posts tagged: #moving

Seeds

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They handed me this box with teary smiles: Remember, we love you. It felt like an urn, full of things dead and over. I couldn’t look at it. I carried it home and packed it away, quickly. Many weeks and miles later we found it at the bottom of a storage container. Greta: Is that a treasure chest?! What’s inside?! Me: They said it was full of love. Greta: Can we open it? Me: I’m not ready. Many guests came to visit our new home, Sweet River. They roamed into my office, scanned the pictures and books on my shelves. Guest: What’s in the box? Me: I’m not sure. It’s from my friends. They gave it to me before I moved away. Guest: You haven’t opened it? Me: I’m thinking of keeping it shut, like a time capsule, until I’m in the nursing home. Guest: Really? Me: I’m not ready. The kids started their new schools. My big house and little heart felt painfully empty. An old friend called, concerned. Friend: It’s time to open the box. Me: I’m not …

Bullies

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I was bullied mercilessly as a kid. It started in 3rd grade, when I suddenly didn’t understand the fast multiplication in blue pen on the overhead projector. I got moved from smart math to regular math. My bully taunted, “Ha! You thought you were smart and you’re NOT! You are STUPID.” I walked through the halls with my head down. On the bus my bully would point and laugh when I moved my book bag over for a neighbor to sit down and she’d walk past ignoring me. “You have NO FRIENDS! You are LAME!” she shouted. I would sink in my seat, cross my arms, and try not to cry. We moved away after 6th grade. My new school in California was totally different. I was offered drugs on the bus and jr highers were having sex under the trailers instead of going to class. It didn’t take long for a bully to find me. “You don’t smoke POT?! You’re such a goody goody. NERD! LOSER!” I don’t think a boy talked to me once and my …

Chosen

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Who doesn’t want to be Chosen? It’s the best! You like me! You picked ME! It’s the core of so many childhood memories: Sit by me on the bus Pick me for your kickball team (actually, please don’t) Sit with us at lunch Mom and Dad, am I your favorite? Birthday girl, pick me to sit by you 6th grade boy, ask me to dance I went to new schools for 7th, 8th, 9th, and 12th grade. It was rough. So many first days of school with zero friends. So many moments of holding my lunch tray with white knuckles looking out at the chaos of a crowded lunchroom. I skipped a lot of those to hang out and read in the bathroom or library. So much savvy required to know how to look approachable but not needy, confident but not aloof. I learned “To Have a Friend You’ve Got to Be a Friend.” Which meant learning how to smile, risk eye contact, and invite someone to be my lab partner. It meant learning to laugh at jokes that I …

A Gentleman’s Invitation

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I started this long story of Surrender on an airplane. I realized that I had life-changing faith not just in a flight crew of strangers but also in God. Hours later God leveraged that reclaimed faith by offering my husband a job that required a major move. This new job was going to be in Georgia. I was hoping for the majestic Pacific Northwest, but instead we were given the sweaty Southeast. Flashback 20 years, Chris and I are dating, dreaming big over schnitzel and knödel in the vineyards of Austria: Chris: “I would love to do economic development in Cambodia, Thailand or Vietnam.” Me: “I can’t do that. It’s too hot. I’m afraid of it being that hot.” Chris: “But what if that’s what God calls us to do?” Me: “I don’t think God would call us to do that. I never even want to move to the South in the States. It’s too hot and gross. No way.” Chris: [secretly touches the engagement ring in his pocket and wonders if he can actually marry such a high-maintenance …