imagining home
We're moving.
Again.
This makes the third
in less than two years.
If you'd just met me at a party and we were getting to know each other and you said "So, do you guys move around a lot?" I'd say "No. We like to stay in one place, settle in, spend quiet evenings on the back patio drinking iced tea. Not us...we're not movers."
I think that's kind of like the time I asked my cousin -- after I'd been married a year and a half and while handing my son a cheerio -- "Is it weird, I still think I'm a virgin?"
In my heart of hearts, I'm a cocooner. Problem is we haven't found the right cocoon yet here in Austin. Or maybe I'm Goldilocks and the third time'll be the charm.
Adding suspense to the whole adventure, up until this week we only knew that we were moving at the end of May but God hadn't yet told us
where
. To be fair we knew He wanted us in central Austin -- same school district -- so that's something. I'm not being cheeky; that really
is
something we're celebrating. The girls both tried two different school options our first year here. The high school they're in now has been on target for them and we're still grinning relief at the discovery.
In March, Brian and I spent a
at Laity Lodge to hear Jamie Smith talk about the
. As in, we need to form a better one -- for ourselves, our children, our community, our congregation. And every single time we walked into another rental house, stepped over someone else's moving chaos, picked our way around their dirty dishes in the sink, unmowed back yard, half-completed remodeling projects I thought about the power of a good imagination. Without it, my faith in the goodness of a providing Father faltered big time.
When I ignored the gift of a Spirit-infused imagination, I walked through some college student's rental debris and got angry at God, Austin, my husband, landlords as a people group, and pretty much anyone else who came to mind. (And, seriously, mothers of Austin college students, when's the last time you asked your kid if they're keeping their house semi-clean? From one mama to another, I'm telling you -- they're not doing it.)
On the other hand, when I walked into a potential next house for our family, calmed and alert to the creative inspiration of the ever-creating Father, Son and Holy Spirit I could see a home hidden in the chaos. Tonight we sign our next lease. Hopefully it's the last one we'll sign for a long, long time. We'll walk through empty rooms, figure what furniture we'll keep or ditch, where the art will hang, mourn the lack of closet space.
We'll do the work of imagining what really matters in the whole scheme of things.
