A change of scenery

Sometimes a change of scenery is less about the roadtrip, less about the milkshakes, less about the sprinklers and the playgrounds and the beaches. Sometimes a change of scenery is about just that: a change of scenery. A chance to see how things look from up here. A few days to gather one's breath and view things from a different perspective.

From up here, I'm not sitting in front of my computer waiting for good news. I'm not looking at our books or photo albums or Matt's toolchest, wondering what goes and what stays. I'm not clicking refresh on our support account three, four, five times a day. And I'm not hiding behind curtains, afraid of the sun, or standing in the kitchen wondering exactly how many cookies I ate that day [answer: eight].

Instead, I'm listening to "the grannies" talk about retirement, realizing we all have something that weighs on our minds and our pocketbooks, hard questions for the future. I'm watching my children play with aunts and uncles and puppies, under the shelter of towering oaks, grateful for families that drop everything for a chance to play catch or build forts at dusk. Instead, I'm awake in the night not from crying babes, but for a sweet glimpse of sleeping boys, head to head, legs and arms filling every inch of their shared bed.

Instead, I'm digging toes in sand, closing my eyes and praying peace... the kind of prayer one can pray from a safe distance, out of the fray. I'm convalescing this worried heart, rehabbing my tired mind, praying peace and still saying yes and listening for His voice in the quiet of a Wisconin pine tree.

While I rest these sandy toes, my man stays behind and works. He's still saying yes, too. And in these five short days, a slight shift. A change of scenery... even if only a step or two.

*** 

I wrote this earlier in the day, before seeing Sarah Bessey's invitation to share what it is that's saving our lives right now. But I knew this was it. I wrote it knowing that these five days, this gift from Matt, this time away, is saving my life right now. Because tonight I watched the wee lad dance in the rain. And I shared an oh-so-rare bottle of wine with my sister-in-law. And I heard thunder and felt wind and closed my eyes on the shores of Lake Michigan. 

This, this moment - here today, gone tomorrow - is saving my life right now. What is saving yours?