Cold Feet (and other reasons not to write)

My feet are actually, literally very cold today.  I sit at my desk, fully distracted by how uncomfortable the two of them are.  It's not astrophysics, though, is it?  I have these nice Uggs Jesse and Annie brought me for Christmas last year so on they go.

Relief.

I wonder if there is something cozy for my mind.  Is there something I can wrap up in to warm this corner and get me to stretch out into this thing, this season, I've looked forward to for so long?

I have not, most definitely have not, looked forward to the off-spring being gone.  One, two, three, four- they are away.  And this is not about that.  They are well.  And I am well.

Oh, I'm not going to pretend empty nest didn't arrive with a sudden, shocking grief.  Even though I saw it coming.  Even though I welcomed the silence as I wept, embracing them on their way.

There were parties when each baby arrived.  No parties to say, "All gone!"

But even so.

This faffing around, this inability to settle at my desk, is not that.

This is a binding cold.

I am a writer.

And my feet are freezing.

Surgery? Seriously?

I found out on Tuesday evening that I need to have a total hysterectomy before returning to Tanzania.

(Groan.)

I was pretty shocked. I cried when Byron picked me up and I told him about it. I wasn't expecting to need major surgery to deal with my issues. That's because I didn't know I had sizable fibroids and a great big cyst in my life.

At this point I'm nervous, annoyed and a little overwhelmed.

I find that I'm struggling, too, with spikes of fear.

Hospitals make me feel sick. I felt faint having a mammogram today. It's weird, I know.

But I also know that I'm thankful for help, incredible technology, advanced medicine, a concerned family and caring friends.

I'm thankful to God for timing and leading and provision.

I'll hand my fear over to him.

Surgery is set for 13 May. Before that, I'll be here and there in Southern California. After that, find me sitting quietly at Mom and Dad's.

A Little Fear on Our Way Toward Departure

Oh Seattle! We felt so loved!

It's nice how love produces love. We felt loved and now we think everyone we talked with in Seattle is the greatest :-) Seriously though, we felt really cared about by all the supporters, mission teams and friends that we met with over the last ten days.

Of all the people we told our "Why we're off to Africa" story to, my favorite was a class of thirty 16 year olds I spoke to at my niece's public high school. I asked them what they can buy for $2. They said a candy bar, a cup of coffee, a cheeseburger. They thought they could maybe make it for a couple hours on $2. We talked about the fact that 2.7 billion people live on less than $2 a day.

I really enjoyed being with that group. It made me happy to be able to tell them about stuff.

Anyway, it won't be long now till we book our tickets for April or May and I suddenly have this weird feeling...

We've been running around raising funds and getting things in order to move and pretty soon we're gonna be there and the dust is gonna settle and you know what? We're going to look around and say "OH MY WORD? WHAT HAVE WE DONE? WHAT ARE WE DOING BACK IN AFRICA??"

I realize it's normal but it can feel a little weird to know something is right and to want it really badly and to be scared to death of it at the same time.