The Windows are Open and I'm Waxing Nostalgic

Summer is here in the South. Our windows are open and the sweet sounds of birds chirping (and garbage trucks barreling by) prance inside. As I sit here at my computer, there's a gentle breeze at my back, while I relish this annual milestone of letting the outdoors in.

Fortunately, our new little home is surrounded by large trees that work to keep our little apartment cooler than you'd expect. When we moved in, the branches were bare and I didn't really believe my landlord when she told us that the entire yard would soon be coated in shade.

Yet, just three months later, here we are. When I first planted my container garden, the leaves were still unfurling and the backyard was filled with light. Now the leaves have grown in so much that it has become a dance of scooting and twirling the containers so that they can bask in the sunny spots that are ever-changing.

I asked my husband the other day, "Does it feel like we've been living here a long time, yet?" Because sometimes, it feels like we've been living here for what seems like forever and at other times—like when I fight to find the light switches, groping for the places they were in our old apartment—it seems like it hasn't been that long at all.

When I think back on all the places I've lived, from Cincinnati to Athens to Birmingham to Grand Rapids to Atlanta, there are aspects that still feel like they happened yesterday: Walking along the cobblestone streets of Athens to meet my best friends for a picnic on the green. Fighting giant cockroaches and grasshoppers with my roommate in Birmingham. Driving to the beach on Lake Michigan. Packing up a huge moving truck and making the two-day journey southbound, with my husband of one month and a future unknown.

And yet then I think about how much has changed, and this thing called life astounds me at how it seems to move so quickly and yet so still at the same time. Somehow, it is both at the very same time. Isn't life such a mystery?

Like the leaves that take shape and the breeze that whispers through my window, today slips by so slowly it is almost unnoticed, with its promises of all that may be. And yet, it changes everything.

Here is to today...

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A New Place to Call Home and Lessons Learned in Moving

Right now, I should be unpacking.

Yep, with only days left at the end of the month, we ended up finding a new apartment and moving two days later. It was a whirlwind, but sometimes I feel like that's the story of our lives. First dating for nine months and getting married ten weeks later, then moving across the country only a handful of weeks after that.

For someone whose greatest pet peeve is being rushed, these fast-paced experiences stretch me, and I'm beginning to learn that that process—however frustrating and stressful it is at the time—is actually a gift. I trust that God is in these experiences, guiding them, timing them, allowing them to transpire in this set amount of time. And that because I'm forced to, I have to lean on him through these things, insignificant as they may be, packing boxes, making phone calls, setting up utilities, turning a cardboard-box labyrinth into a home-sweet-home. Whatever the circumstances might be, it's the leaning on Him that is what matters. That's what it's all about.

This perspective gives purpose to the seemingly small hardships that crop up, that there is potential even in those for growth and insight and awareness and gratitude beyond what we may have ever imagined.

I'm learning to open my eyes to that and thank Him for bringing these things to me and stretching and showering grace upon me through them.

Towers of cardboard boxes loom, even as I've unpacked and unpacked for the past three days. And yet, I'm already finding such joy at our new little abode, even as we discover leaky faucets and forgotten work orders. I'm trying to keep the perspective that matters at hand.

Here we are in a new neighborhood, where Victorian mansions are displayed about like dollhouses in a toystore and serene parks with swing sets for kids dot the landscape. We have a porch and a little shed for storage (you do not know how incredible this is to me!). We have an extra hour to add to our day, thanks to a shorter commute.

Truly, life is good. It is something that I must remind myself of moment by moment in the midst of whatever circumstances arise—today, tomorrow, ten years from now. Truly, God is good, in the midst of every single bit of it.

So now, while I unpack, it's likely that this blog will show a slowdown of posts at least for the coming week or two. But without worry, everything will be back up and running before too long. If I would have had more time to plan, I'm sure that I could have had a bunch of extra posts ready to go. But life doesn't always work out like that, I'm learning! Thanks for your patience in the meantime; it's back to unpacking for me!

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