Leaving Home

Written on Weds. January 21.

So many stories to write about our journey to get here. Some good – some not so good. I think the whole transition won’t feel real until we are here two weeks – and not packing to go home. There is still so much to do. Get the house sold, WRITE THANK-YOU NOTES, shut down our home phone and internet and cable. We needed to have our connections running up until the very end. Now we have to cancel from here. The dog arrives tomorrow and the car sometime in the next 3 weeks.

I feel like an exchange student. They all say how they delay packing until the bitter end. Us too! I know we are in another country but I don’t know if it will feel so far away or not. Right now we are still so connected to home.

We still worry about Mason. We’ve really launched him into the world. I guess no more then he launched himself when he moved away for 18 months to be in Brethren Volunteer Service. I’m sure it is odd for him living nearby his home but not being able to live in the house that was once his. It’s hard to know another’s thought, struggles, concerns, and even joys. He’s a bit alone in his situation. I don’t know if he knows any other 20 something’s whose parents moved away and left them at home to make their own way. There must be someone in the world who knows what he is going through. This is a very non-traditional way to live.

We have moved 3 times around Lancaster. From our two places to the townhouse after being married, from the townhouse to the farm and two years later from the farm to the house we built in 1995 on Browning Road. Mason only remembers ever living at the house on Browning Road.

For us it’s no big deal to be moving again – just another stop along the way. Before being married I moved from my house on Pine Street to college, then back and forth for 4 years to end in Lancaster. It’s just what most people do as they get older – move from one place to another. I grew up in one home until college too, so I can relate to Mason.

There were great memories made in that house! 5 foreign exchange students living with us, Alan (our little from Big Brothers/Big Sisters) stayed there too. Mason grew up there. We had his kindergarten birthday party in the basement. Painting on the wall in the powder room, Mason’s sky ceiling. Working in my office. Campfires in the back yard. Good Times!

We prayed a lot before leaving the farm house dream behind. We knew God gave us a house with four bedrooms for a reason. We didn't have children of our own to fill it but we invited others in. I loved that home and it was a dream to design it and have made it our own. Now it is a dream fulfilled.

Now we have a new dream to follow and a new call to answer.