Hitting the Home button

I know what I want to say for this week's Sunday Tea post but I have heard the siren call of rare beautiful weather luring me outside as the nausea of this past week subsides. The return of yet another heatwave will have me back at the keyboard this afternoon.  :)

I've been curious about the nonfiction book Almost Amish after hearing good reviews so I used Amazon credit to download it this week (at a good price).  Being a Crunchy Con* kind of Christian, I have thoroughly enjoyed what I read so far.

Recently I was contemplating my existence... which seems to happen more the older I get... and realized I was ending up where I thought hubby and I would start after college... kind of... I had better explain.

Since his Master's Degree is in Wood Science - Furniture Engineering, we assumed we would end up in North Carolina.  We even spent part of our honeymoon in Ashville, Hickory, and then Virginia.  As it turned out... God had other plans and we went NORTH to Michigan for nine years.

But I had these newlywed dreams of living in a small-ish house in the mountains... cooking, reading, writing, gardening, raising children, and doing needlework (this was during my cross stitch and tapestry stage). 

I not only ended up in Michigan instead of a Southern state but problem pregnancies resulted in one child residing in Heaven and the other two born twelve years apart.  Instead of a house in the hills I eventually chose an office in a corporation for years.

It was quite interesting to ponder these present days.  Here I am in the empty nest stage living in a small-ish house at the corner of the forest just miles from my hometown (not the mountains but wooded and lovely), gardening in a drought, cooking, reading, writing, and finding my way back to working with my hands again very soon.

I think there is a dream within all of us which may never be completely realized this side of Eternity.   I recently read a description of what one theologian thought our first seconds in Heaven will be like... as we realize this is the Place we have always belonged, the Place in which we have searched all our life.  :)

So many dreams have not come true and they never will as I live in a finite body within the limitations of time.  But what surprised me as I pondered this empty nest situation is how that which I thought would not be a good thing became a gift that He prepared long ago.

In some ways I have clicked the Home button and while it looks differently than anticipated... and it is far from perfection... it can be good.

I'll write more later about Almost Amish (the nonfiction as opposed to the fiction book I loved earlier this week) but so far it is giving me much to think about.   Now to water what remains of the garden, enjoy a cup of coffee on the deck before the temperatures rise... and let the dishes wait while I read.  They will be there when I have to turn on the air conditioner.  :)

*Crunchy Con is a book by Rod Dreher which describes Christians who may be conservative in many ways but are similar to liberals in their care for the environment, sustainable gardening, organic foods, caring for the poor, etc.