Love

It should be obvious, but I seem to keep needing reminding of it...

I'm more and more sure that the difference beween good and bad in me is the difference between loving and not. Between letting myself feel and understand others, and not taking the time, or not making the effort, or forgetting.

And I can only ask that God keep leading me back to the former.

Writing again

Writing in here again by suggestion, and because I've been thiking I should write more often.

Though I'm not feeling too deep just now, or maybe just too tired to write anything deep. Things are going well though - it seems we're close to having a location for the wedding, and I have a sense of things generally taking a turn for the better, or at least that they will if I follow through.

Engaged

And very happy :)

A series of unfortunate events

The last couple weeks have been...unexpected, to say the least.

To start, I now have a niece :) Her name is Teagan Maxwell, and she was born to my sister on Good Friday.

...and then a couple dayslater she was found to have a faulty heart valve and was airlifted into Children's Hospital in Seattle. My mom had been with Susan for the birth, and she flew drove with her over the pass into the city, and I canceled my plans for the weekend to clean up my place so they could stay over.

This turned out to be unnecessary, as they got lodging at the Ronal McDonald House, and then on Easter morning I fell ill with what turned out to be appendicitis. So, early Tuesday morning I had my appendix removed. It didn't burst, but they said it was very infected, and kept me an extra day for observation. This mostly meant that I had to lie around and watch TV for a day, and also that I got to eat a lot of pudding (I cleaned out the supply on my floor).

They let me go home on Wednesday around noon, and my mom stayed at my place after that. And then on Friday she went out to get lunch in my car, and was hit by a woman who ran a red light. So I ended up back at the same hospital, in the opposite role. My mom ended up being fine, though, thankfully, and we manage to laugh a bit at the ridiculousness of the situation.

My car, on the other hand, was a total loss. I got a rental to get through the next few days and, although I managed to lock myself out of it with the engine running that Sunday, no further serious misfortunes occurred. I've since gotten a new (used) car using some of my savings, and it seems likely that my insurance company will send me a check at some point...

And Teagan is doing well. After an oopen heart surgery and several days spent on a ventilator, she's now breathing on her own, and has been moved out of intensive care.

And I'm currently at my dad's house in Vegas, where we just surprised him with a party for his fitieth birthday. So I think things are turning around.

And honestly, I'm not sure what God meant for me, or any of us in alll of that. Something that occurs to me though, is that it did force me to step back. I haven't been to work for two weeks (and given what's happened, they're ok with that), and it has been good to just stop for a bit. I think I'd let myself get too caught up in what I was doing in the moment (this seems to be my general failing) and stopped trying to listen to God. And I was more than a little down for that...

I'm hopeful now though. Hebrews 10:35-39 has been on my mind lately. I trust Him, and I'll try to live like it.

Homesick, at home

There's an old Japanese poem that says, essentially, "Even when I'm in Kyoto, I long to be in Kyoto". I think maybe I get that now.

I'm at home, in Edwardsville, with Isabel. And it's wonderful to be here with her, but it hurts too. It's been so long, and I don't know that I realized how much I missed this place, how much I missed the people here, until I was here again. We spent the evening eating dinner with Brad and Elizabeth; I feel like I haven't seen them in an age. We stayed late, but the evening ended too soon. And it feels like I won't be here long enough, but also that I never could be. I suppose we have to accept that the world moves on, and so do we.

Which isn't to say it's wrong to hold onto some things, for as long as we're allowed to, at least. It does make me wish I'd made better use of my time here, not that I think I did such a bad job of it. It makes me want to make better use of my time now too though, both for the rest of this trip and onward.

I want to give people more of my time, and I think that's a good thing.

And I should get to bed.