Heading Home and Packing Another Suitcase

Tomorrow we board another plane and return home.  A month has passed since landing in Vienna.  A month of re-acclimating to this city, a month of sweating like pigs due to a weird heatwave in Europe, a month of laughing so hard with old friends that I thought I wouldn't catch my breath, a month of seeing things within myself that I had to examine closely and search for a place of healing, a month of shedding tears out of empathy, exhaustion, and relived memories, a month of dealing with Oklahoma things from a Central Europe time zone, a month of hearing stories across from cafe tables while sipping coffee, a month of a lot of mental work, a month of a lot of walking, a month of meeting people, a month of talking to God about what the next steps are for Fahrenheit, a month of ... life.

Packing, yet another suitcase, I find myself feeling temporary.  I always feel like this when we travel.  Mostly because for the last five years, every summer brought packing of a suitcase to go to Oklahoma for the purpose of reconnecting with friends and family and to meet with Fahrenheit partners and donors.  For five years it's been a cycle of packing and unpacking.

This summer the cycle is reversed by location only.  However, this time I pack bags to return to Oklahoma and into another temporary home.  If I'm honest, it's been a year of temporary.  Trying to put roots in temporary soil is a weird feeling.  I'm ready to have my own space and my own things and my own zip code.

When I feel out of sorts, like there aren't others on the planet who can identify with my temporary condition of displacement, I need only to look at the message of the Bible that tells me feeling temporary should be a state of mind in whatever permanent place I am registered.  Feeling temporary because this planet was never created for me to put deep roots and plant myself for a stay that would last forever.  It's not my home. I know that intellectually but fail in comprehending the gravity of the temporary nature ... until I pack another suitcase.

Leaving Vienna and returning to Oklahoma makes me want to grieve.  Vienna feels more like home because this is the last place I had a home of my own.  Yet, I'm learning to live in a new space in my spirit that tells me adventure awaits.  God is always creating.  Sometimes that creation process looks like a new flower bursting out of messy soil that grows in a beautiful garden.  Sometimes, however, it's a deeper place of contentment within a human heart while waiting for a home to call your own while living on the planet.  It's looking at all God is doing around you and being content that He created me to firmly root myself in Him, knowing that He is my rock, my permanence, my home.  Where He puts me is good.  Where He calls home, even if for a month of living out of suitcase, is good.

So, we board another plane and head ... home.  Along with the tangible things I pack in my suitcase, I pack a month of moments that have reassured me that God is always good and creating and moving and working.