The Edge [of all] Journeys

The day went moderately well: I watched the rest of “The Pirates who Don’t do Anything”  with the kids, the rain stopped, Renee took the kids to the library in town which freed up some valuable project time, I went over to meet our friend’s neighbor to offer replacing the bike ramp / board my son and his friend broke trying to use it as a trampoline, I hauled another load of stuff to get rid of out of the trailer, had a quick but productive talk with Joe, put the chicken in the oven for dinner, set up the computer and flat screen that serves as one of my development machines and doubles as a large picture frame with 40,000 of mine and my dad’s photos (including scans) parading in an endless random slide-show, figured out how to pull down the awning, immediately saw that it had been poorly cared for by the original owners which led to a massive soap-broom-and-hose scrub down session, and set up the exercise bouncer (one of our kids’ favorite things back home was our huge trampoline, and we figured with all the new trailer rules – no running inside, no jumping inside, no bouncing on the bed, etc – they should at least have something they can bounce on rain or shine… and hopefully prevent breaking any further boards-that-are-NOT-trampolines).

And that’s where the day got dicey.

In our first bit of RV life drama, our black water tank clogged up. For those thinking, “big deal…” or “what the heck is black water… is that some sci fi thing like dark matter or something?” Well, the interesting thing about modern conveniences like city water and sewage is that they make us almost completely oblivious to the amount of bodily wastes we each generate on a daily basis. Not so in an RV. One has the blessed opportunity to become intimately aware of the byproducts of such gratifying endeavors as eating.

So, when things stopped disappearing down the toilet, I knew we had a problem. Hmmm. Where to start? The internet of course. After a wee bit of research – the kind one always wishes they had done before the information is actually needed, I launched into action with some great helpers. The scene was hilarious, and now I cannot believe I neglected to have Renee catch some shots, but let me paint a mental picture for you: Imagine me in the bathroom wearing latex gloves pushing a garden hose (metal end cut off) down the toilet as far as I can and holding the flush lever open with my toes while my 3 year old son tries to shine a maglight down the hole so I can see if any progress is actually being made and my wife – who is outside – communicates with me via speaker phone (cell phone to cell phone) so I can have her turn the water supply on and off and pull this lever and push that lever as necessary. And that really about sums it up.

Of course, that was after several other… um… less invasive solutions failed in the attempt. In the end, I think we are on the path to recovery albeit not quite out of the woods just yet. There is still quite a bit of black water in that black water tank. I’ve poured a couple bottles with very scary warning labels down the toilet, and added a bunch of extra water, and I’m hoping things will be sufficiently liquefied by morning to get a clean dump. What an paradoxical notion.

Now, I’m just sitting here at 10:30pm sipping wine, eating chicken, thinking about all the other things I would have liked to have gotten done tonight, and blogging about it. Life has never been better. I know you think I’m crazy, but this is exactly why we hit the road in the first place – well, one of the reasons at least – to face life head on and force confrontations with challenges that we’d otherwise never even know are out there.

And what happens in the process? Why even bother? Because it changes us, teaches us, refines us, sharpens us, stretches us, enlivens us. YHWH uses all of these mundane and even, in some cases, gross / disturbing / painful experiences to strengthen us.

The e-silence is broken! I have finally rescued the laptop from the truck. I think this is the longest I have gone without  being connected in quite some time… In fact, it has been rather quite nice. I was <gasp> reticent, in fact, to jack back in. But I figured a quick recap was in order… for the record. And all the lovely Facebook comments / responses really inspired me to get an update out there – thank you ALL for the friendship and kind thoughts.

We didn’t actually end up pulling out until 9pm, Saturday, April 11th. It truly was the endless day. It took an hour or so to hitch up because the weight bottomed out on the truck further than it had when I blocked it up last time. Basically I couldn’t pull the tongue jack in far enough to get all the weight on the truck as it was still resting on the blocks as well. So, I had to use jack stands, pull the tongue jack all the way in, remove s few blocks, jack back up off the stands, remove stands, jack back down onto truck, there. I know you find that all incredibly interesting.

The trailer was HEAVY and we weaved and bobbed a mile or so to the gas station for a precarious fill-up and the obligatory bathroom stops even though EVERYONE had gone before we left. And then we prayed and gave our trip to YHWH. There were many uncertainties yet: would the truck handle all the weight we had dumped into the trailer? Would it pull us all over teh road? Would I ge ttoo tired to continue? And so on… It was immensely helpful to take all those questions and throw them into Trust.

9:40pm actually finally on the road. Puttered along at 50 mph average to keep all the gauges happy. Sometimes faster, sometimes slower depending on the terrain.

11:00pm-ish it was obvious I was physically incapable of staying awake. For those who have braved the noble road with me, you will recognize immediately that this is quite uncharacteristic. I have driven solo from Colorado to Virginia straight through. I have driven solo from the coast of Louisiana to Canada straight through. But there was no way I was going to safely make the 4 hour cruise after the delightful schedule we had been keeping. With no rest areas or Walmarts anywhere in GPS sight, I thought at least a beverage was in order. Sheetz gas station turned out to be very hospitable and gracious hosts and I caught a couple winks between various kids waking up grumpy.

1:30am-ish back on the road. I hit equilibrium at 2am on the dot. There is this Place on the Road that I am quite fond of. It is a Place of perfect awareness that fatigue cannot touch. It is a Place of Perpetual Motion. It is a Place of Grace and Life where every physical and spiritual sense is completely alive. It certainly helped that I stumbled upon an amazing radio show to provide the soundtrack: http://www.starsend.org/broadcast.html – that Place on the Road always demands a soundtrack, and I tuned in right before 2am when Arc was up on the Playlist. Now, I’m the kind of person who believes that everything happens for a reason – for a Purpose – and, though I also realize that one can read too much into things as well, I find immensely curious if not downright cool that the inaugural song of the trip was by a group called Arc. The layers of puns and meanings there are numerous, but the more obvious ones revolve around feeling a bit like  we’re here now in our own little ark riding along atop a sea of circumstance over which we have incomplete control.

4am we finally pulled into the driveway on the Farm… after 2 puke incidents (there has been something going around), and 2 stops at the very end to reattach each weight distribution bar (something screwy going on there on certain angle turns or something).

The last couple days have been full of fellowship, realization (as the surreal slowly gives way to the uberreal), rest (although not quite as much as I’d like yet, because…), and unpacking / sorting / organizing. It might sound funny, be we really do have a lot of unpacking to do. We’re now in the move in phase: i.e. how can we possibly organize everything so that it looks like things are not cluttered. It is so much fun.

We’re parked by a pond. We have power, water, and sewer connections. The kids have a Farm to explore. Renee and I already have a long to-do list to streamline this new life. Photos and GPS data will get posted when I get around to it. And I should have gone to bed 3 hours ago 🙂 Some things change hard. We are feeling so blessed!

I thought today would never end… and still it goes on… but we are finally on the precipice of a flagrant plunge and it almost feels good. Really good. The trailer is packed so tight one can literally no longer set foot in it. And yet you’d not believe how much we sold away,  bartered away, gave away, threw away. And still there’s more. We have begun an infinite purging. The stuff just never ends. How many times did we feel like we were so close today, only to have an eerily similar feeling hours later. But finally… I just have to prep the trailer, hitch up the suburban and we are gone. Just like that. A vapor.

Many thanks to dad, mom, Jonathan, and Jeff and Elizabeth for their heroic feats to help us pull this off. And of course, all thanks and honor to YHWH… this departure, this timing is a miracle.

3:30am … it’s looking a lot like an all nighter. so much to pack yet. Joy is crying again. Renee hasn’t slept much (if at all) despite trying. these are the anvils upon which truly living is forged. i might end up wearing Joy in the backpack carrier while i knock out some of the packing. we’ve said it before but i am dumbfounded at the amount of STUFF suffocating us. and it isn’t just shear volume – it’s the kind of weight that is so hard to shed even though we don’t want any of it… there is so much sorting yet to do but no time to sort. our lives will unfold as a continuous sorting. yet even in the midst of this maelstrom i am confident that every Red Sea in our path will part just as it did in the Exodus of Old… but of course, it’s every bit as looming and menacing until it does. i expect tomorrow will dawn with departure.

Unbelievable. Today is my last day of working at the NSC after 8 adventure-filled years tackling and getting tackled by some of the most amazing projects in my field… most of which, of course, I cannot talk about freely. I have had the privilege to meet and work with a wonderful range of professionals, and of course, the memories are endless.

I thought I’d sort of start a place to capture some of those memories as a way of saying goodbye to this season of my life. It has been a long season (in a very good sense) and I’m sure it will take a while to transition mentally and emotionally. I will continue to update this list as I think of additional moments, friendships, etc. (most of which will probably be completely obscure to the average reader). Please feel free to add your own memories in the comments too (as long as you keep it family-friendly). In no particular order, but generally working from the present to the past, and without expending too much effort to keep from being cheesy:

• The B & J show… thanks for all the laughs.
• My parting portal gift… sorry guys… blame MS.
• Transition madness… that could of course be broken down into nearly infinite memories all by itself (who wants to write the book with me?) 🙂
• The messed up badges.
• Much more to come… [I have to wrap things up here with out-processing]

The barley is Aviv in Israel! (Photos)

The first reNEWed moon starts the year this friday night – “This month is the beginning of months for you, it is the first month of the year for you.” Therefore, YHWH willing, we leave in 2 weeks after the pattern of the original Passover.

It hardly seems real. One week left at work. A week after that to finish emptying the house of all the remaining material trappings that cling to us (and it feels like there’s quite a lot left). And then a Severance. The old passes. The new comes. It is not too soon.

A dark storm gathers on the horizon. It may yet take years to reach its fulness and shed its fury, but it will not find us on these shores.

There is so much yet to do, but I know it will all fall into place – guided by the Hand that upholds the laws of creation and brings forth the Aviv barley in its time.

[loving, thoughtful mother (a month ahead of time)]:

“What would you like for your birth day dinner?”

[the honest sage]:

“robots inside my cake!”

Part of this whole process is trying to find employment that will tolerate our 100% remote circumstances. There are more options for us than you might think: Renee is an amazing artist and graphic designer and I am an experienced programmer and technology consultant with some remarkable credentials from past projects. Our “Plan B” is to do this completely Freelance if we have to… and we might just have to. Today I got word that one of the positions that interested me, and for which I had interviewed, is not going to work out. I’m a little disappointed, but also relieved – even though they might have been willing to consider the remote arrangement, I think they were looking for a larger up-front commitment than I was completely comfortable with (at least initially while we’re trying to figure out the basics of our new lifestyle). So, one less decision to make. That door is closed. But it means we’re still considering all the options and trusting for finality on our income to materialize at some point. This is completely true to what we knew would happen when we decided to start this process: it is stretching and building our trust in the Creator as our Provider.

Through this prism, then, I found myself considering the big picture of our transition as I was reading Jeremiah 32 this morning when I came to verses 22 and 23: “And You gave them this land, of which You swore to their fathers to give them, a land flowing with milk and honey. And they came in and possessed it, but they did not obey Your voice nor did they walk in Your Torah [loving instructions]. They did not do ALL that You commanded them to do, so you brought all this evil upon them.” (emphasis mine)

As I read this I was convicted: am I doing all of this for the right reasons? What started out as a simple dream and desire that Renee and I shared even before we were married is finally coming to pass. But are we stepping into this merely because we’ve always wanted to do it, or are we truly going because we’re committed to Yahweh’s greater purpose in it? This morning I was keenly aware that my heart is still trying to hold onto my own ideas and desires for our Journeys, which maybe explains why it can be so hard to get motivated to do everything it will take to finally depart. Those ideas and desires are not bad – in fact, I firmly believe that they are planted in us by our Heavenly Father to get us headed in a particular direction. However, alone they are incomplete, and pursued without Yahweh’s purposes to guide them, they are empty.

And so, to clarify where my heart is, I wrote the words of this prayer:

Father Yahweh – forgive me for loving worldly comforts and securities so much. I hate loving them. I hate the hesitation caused in my by that affection. Forgive my hesitation. As Your people physically departed Egypt but left many of their hearts behind in slavery, please do not let us make the same mistake. Circumcise our hearts as we depart so that we cling completely to You. Cause us to remember Lot’s wife.

I want our travels to be about Purpose and not just adventure. I want them to be for Your honor and not for any attention drawn to us. I want them to be filled with labor for Your Kingdom and not merely a vacation from the world. I confess: we do not know how to do this. We have an amazing responsibility to raise our children in Your Ways and to provide for their needs. Strengthen us to trust in Your provision!

We place ourselves in Your Hands – to go where you show us. To do what you ask us. I don’t want to seek any of this for my own pleasure or satisfaction – You will fill us along the way – but I want this to be about completely obeying ALL Your beautiful plans for our family. We will not be safe outside of Your Design. I know this. We will not be successful in our own strength. I know this. But if we follow the paths which you have already laid, and guard to keep our hearts in Your Present Purposes, I also know that you will add so much more to our journeys than we could ever hope or imagine.

Help us to do what it takes. Help us to find balance before the coming chaos.