Settling

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On October 12, 2013

In Other

We moved in two weeks ago.  And since our anniversary was last week, that means that it was almost exactly 13 years ago that we lived in this apartment.

Not much has changed.  Well, except the rent.  

We even are using the exact same washer/dryers that we used 13 years ago.  

15 years ago, actually, since I lived in Number 9.

We had left practically nothing in the States. We brought nothing with us from Tanzania except 7 boxes, most of which were filled with gifts for other people.  

We had no furniture, no kitchen supplies, no toys for the kids, and no warm clothes.  

Yet here with are, with a full home.  

Pam gave us a recliner.

Maggie gave us a bed for Josiah.

Gil’s folks gave us a couch from their own house, and Gil’s mom went garage-sale-hunting for weeks.

Nicole snagged us a fantastic fridge.

My parents brought down the bunk bed that my brother had slept in, that my Dad had slept in. 

Folks from Hillside gave us bags of warm clothes.

and Valerie wrote to us a few months ago and said, “My Dad just passed away; do you want his furniture?”  She gave us beds and a table and and a dresser and a whole kitchen full of supplies.   

One of the best things about this apartment are the little bathroom heaters.  Gil can’t stop me from turning that on.  

I didn’t spend three hours cooking down tomatoes to make that sauce.  It took me 10 minutes to make dinner.  That, too, is a beautiful thing.

My cup runneth over.  

Some Of Us Are Cold

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On October 11, 2013

In Other

Some of us are bringing our bed covers out with us in the morning.  

Some of us are working with ear muffs on.

It’s in the 60’s sometimes out here in Southern California, and some of us with African blood are really cold.  

Gil won’t let us turn the heat on yet.  He says, If this were Finland, we’d all be wearing shorts.  

Shoot….It’s going to be a long winter.


New

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On October 4, 2013

In Other

A habit is defined as

A recurrent, often unconscious pattern of behavior that is acquired through frequent repetition



When you live in a place long enough, you form habits.  They are comforting.  Your body goes through the motions even when you are sleepy; your car goes into autopilot; you don’t have to use so much mental energy when going through your day.  Habits can be a really good thing.

In Tanzania, I used to spend a lot of time helping new folks get oriented.  I would tell them, “It feels so strange…but don’t worry, give yourself six months to get used to things.”

It’s funny, now, being on the other side of that.  I am American, yet my habits are still Tanzanian.

I constantly forget what side of the car to get into.  A couple times, I actually have gotten into the right side of the car, ready to drive, and sit there confused for a few moments before I start feeling stupid.  I keep turning on the windshield wipers instead of the indicator…oops, we’re in America, that would be the turn signal.  Driving takes total concentration as I keep reminding myself, Stay on the right side of the road.  I drove to Ikea by myself the other day and was extremely proud of myself.

I was incredibly excited to go to Costco to stock my kitchen.  In the last eight years, every time we’ve been home, I’ve gone to Costco with my Mom and purchased the following:  cold medicine, Parmesan cheese, deodorant, and taco seasoning.  Sometimes chocolate chips, depending on how we were doing with space.  I always checked out the weight of everything I bought.  It’s how world travelers think.

So anyway, the thought of going to Costco to buy whatever I wanted was pretty exciting.  But once I was there, I didn’t really know what to do.  The first things I put into my cart were a large bag of rice and a large bag of beans.  You mean, those are not the first things you buy at Costco?  Old habits die hard.

The first few times I went shopping, I kept forgetting to buy dishwasher detergent.  I sort of forgot I had a dishwasher.  When I finally remembered and started my first load, I felt a huge sense of accomplishment.

When I’m in store, I mentally walk through the steps.  Get out your wallet.  Slide your card.  Sign the little thingy.  



I feel clumsy and awkward.  I feel like if I looked international, people would understand my awkwardness, but I look like I belong here, so I should know what I am doing.  If I happen to mention to strangers that we just moved here from Tanzania, I might as well said Mars.

I praise God that I am living in a place I remember, that hasn’t changed all that much in 8 years.  That helps a lot.  It’s all coming back to me, as if waking up from a long sleep.

And I am thankful for the chance to remember what it feels like to be new.  Pray for your missionary friends today, who are adjusting to a new place somewhere out in the world.  And go out and hug that immigrant woman who just moved in down the street.  Show her how to work her dishwasher.

So….What are you doing this year?

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On October 2, 2013

In Other

We’re getting that question a lot.  Here’s the answer.

We are not on vacation.

We are not even on sabbatical. 

When I was a kid, it used to be called furlough.  Most mission agencies don’t call it that anymore because furlough means a leave of absence or vacation.  Which it is not. 

Instead, we call it Home Assignment. 

First of all:  Why are we staying a whole year? 

Our mission requires us to be in the States about 20% of our time.  In the past 8 years, we’ve been in the States approximately 7 months.  So we’re kind of making up for lost time.  There was never a good time to take a Home Assignment while we were at HOPAC.  Since we are between ministries now, it works.

Secondly:  What exactly are you doing if you are not on vacation?

Let me start by saying this: 

We all talk about the Body of Christ.  But as missionaries, we are more keenly aware of our need for it than we would otherwise recognize. 

We cannot do what we do without the Body of Christ. 

I’m not just stating that figuratively.  We cannot.  

We are an extension of the Church in America, and specifically five congregations in California, so we need to be connected to them. 

That does not easily happen when we are 10,000 miles away.  It’s been 8 years.  A lot has changed in your lives; a lot has changed in our lives.  So many people are new in these churches that they don’t even know who we are. 

So it is important that we spend time in the States so that we can continue that personal connection.  Because if we don’t have the Body behind us, there is no use in us going.

So what are we doing this year?

  • Sharing our vision for ministry with any small group or individuals who want to hear about it.
  • Preaching in churches (well, Gil is, anyway!)
  • Serving our supporting churches in any way possible.  We will especially be helping out at our sending church here in So. Cal.  We told FCC to consider us as part of their staff…and put us to work!
  • And most importantly, doing everything we can to make connections with people.  We will be having people over for dinner once or twice a week; we will be attending whatever social activities we can manage at our five supporting churches….for example, this month Gil is attending two different Men’s Retreats at two different churches!

We were offered a rent-free, full-sized house about an hour away from here that we could have lived in all year.  We turned it down for two-bedroom apartment, because we wanted to be close to FCC.  If the whole point of us being here is to connect with the Church, then we’d better be nearby.

We’ll be doing other things as well–Gil will be studying and preparing curriculum for his upcoming new ministry, we all will be deepening our level of Swahili, and we will be spending lots of time with grandparents. 

So if you attend one of our supporting churches, I hope you’ll see us a lot.  If we invite you over for dinner, it’s because we want to get to know you (again).  We love you; we need you.  And we hope that we will live up to our calling to be your extension of the Body of Christ in Tanzania.

Adventures in [our] Odyssey

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On September 29, 2013

In Other

We rolled into southern California yesterday at noon.

During these last six weeks, there were many times I would wake up in the morning and have to remind myself what state we were in and whose house we were at.  Or, I would leave the bathroom and need to remind myself who I had just been talking to.

This is why:

47 days

27 states driven through

30 families/singles visited

21 homes slept in

6 hotel rooms

9,240 miles

About those 9,240 miles

We had no flat tires.  We had no breakdowns.  Three cheers for our Honda Odyssey!  Gil said, “Can you imagine driving this far in Tanzania with no flat tires?”  Impossible.

We never got lost.  We almost always arrived on time, except when we forgot about time zones.  We used a combination of Google Maps and a GPS, and all was well.  We named the voice “Betsy.”  Betsy never let us down.  In fact, even though I was a little jealous of Betsy’s ability to give directions to my husband in a calm, clear, and concise manner, she is probably the reason that Gil and I are still friends after 9,240 miles.

We listened to books on tape.  We sang at the top of our lungs.  We gave stickers out to anyone who didn’t have to stop to pee. (Is that even legal?  Oops.  But nobody got dehydrated….except me, who got altitude sickness in Colorado.)

About those three kids

Our kids were amazing.  They got into the car when we told them to and got out when we told them to without questioning.  They hugged when we told them to hug.  They never asked “Are we there yet?”  Because they figured out pretty quick that we were never “there.”  They played with new children and new toys and slept on a new floor almost every single day.  They had no schedule, no routine, no consistent bedtime.  Yet they kept smiling and playing and Josiah put the seat up in the bathroom almost every time.

It helped that they could not touch each other in the car.  It helped that they each had their own Kindle Fire.  It helped that we had sticker charts and a prize box.

We had a great time as a family.  As every good TCK knows, home is where your family is.  Period.

About hospitality

They always smiled; they always hugged us, even if we arrived after midnight, even if they had just moved into their house the day before.

We slept in beautifully decorated guestrooms.  We slept on air mattresses.  We slept on couch beds in the living room.  We slept on futons.  A couple times people even gave us their own beds, which is a humbling experience.  People always said, Help yourself to anything in the kitchen.  We were made special desserts.  We were taken out for ice cream.  We ate grilled chicken and corn on the cob more times than we could count, which was great because we love grilled chicken and corn on the cob, but it did become a kind of standing family joke because we had it so many times.  At least 4 families were into whole foods and gave us raw milk and organic apples.  Other families brought southern-style BBQ take-out or microwaveable meals.

All of it, every bit, was amazing.  I loved witnessing different family cultures–on raising kids, on cooking food, on house decoration and cleanliness, on bedtimes and routines and different kinds of fun.  There were big houses and small houses, rented houses and owned houses, brick houses and wood houses, city houses and rural houses.  I have never experienced so many different types of homes and families and types of family culture in such a short amount of time.

Hospitality is not dead in America.  Every home was welcoming and warm–every one.  It didn’t matter whether they had a beautiful guest room or just an air mattress.  It didn’t matter if they were great cooks or just reheated something.  They all were generous; they all gave us their time, their energy, their love…..and it all was wonderful.

For most of my adult life, I have been the host.  I love being the host.  I had a harder time being the guest–the receiver.  To be the recipient of so much generosity and grace was very humbling.

About the people

Our friends.

Our friends.

Do you realize how astounding it is to realize that you have friends all over America?

We have said good-bye in our lives more than I care to remember.

Between being a missionary kid and an adult missionary, my friendships have been transient.  I seem to lose them and get new ones every couple of years, and that has often been really, really hard.

But the benefit?

Now I have friends all over the United States.

During these last six weeks, Gil and I often said that we felt like we were debriefing from….our entire lives.   We visited friends from pretty much every major season of our lives.  We got to reconnect with people and re-live memories that spanned from my childhood onward.  It was incredible.  Over dinner, around a backyard campfire, in a hot tub under the stars, many times over the din of children jumping, children laughing, we talked.  The long, deep, soul-nurturing conversations with history-friends were definitely the highlight of this trip.  



Thank you, Friends.  We are so blessed by you.

THE END

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