First night 'coming home' to the new house. No company over. Cooking dinner. Doing laundry. Just living... here.
I turned my eyes up to our new house number as I parked tonight and peeled myself out of the car, very tired after a busy weekend.
And it's starting to feel real now.
Again, life is moving. And the whirlwind has continued. I still cannot grasp how very different life was six short months ago. What is this road that we're on? Even having gotten all that we wanted, what sense can we make of these passing moments?
I feel time passing now. I feel the breath pulled from my lips. There's no stopping the moments. And thoughts of nieces and nephews, of other new houses to be met with in the future, of a very different family filling the rooms of my home than the one I now know flood my mind. 'This growing up stuff, man I don't know.' These inevitable changes are pouring through my mind right now and making me want to hang on to those things that are precious to me; those things that fill my current 'now'.
I'm grasping for the wind again, trying to hold what was meant to flow by me. What is life but a vapor? Caught up in a strong wind and swirling by me, it is a vapor that feels particularly elusive tonight.
We got all we wanted. The destination has been reached. And as we stagger up the last few steps, straining for the top of this hill, I lift my eyes to see an endless road laid out before me and so many more mountains to be faced. And my eyes are on my companions who've made me strong and the thought of a change hurts tonight.
Again, we've gotten 'there'. And yet I'm not the 'her' I thought I'd be by now. I'm finding more and more that there are seldom natural mile markers that coincide with spiritual growth. Stature in Christ comes through the journey and cannot be measured by the fence posts. Again I'm at the top. Again there's more ahead. Again I thought I'd be a stronger traveler by now.
'What is this road? What is this journey? And where does time go...'
I'm beginning to think that there is no destination in this life. All we will ever know on this earth are a series of steps forward. We make our peace with the past that we wish we could change. We make our peace with a future that we cannot avoid. And we drink in the moment that we're in and hope not to miss too much.
Soft pajamas. Curled up on my new bedroom floor. With boxes all around me. And my precious family moving about downstairs. And the confession of the moment is that a Miley Cyrus song is speaking to me. Oh well. Take a glance:
I can almost see it
That dream I'm dreaming
But there's a voice inside my head saying
"You'll never reach it"
Every step I'm taking
Every move I make feels
Lost with no direction
My faith is shaking
But I've gotta keep trying
Gotta keep my head held high
There's always gonna be another mountain
I'm always gonna wanna make it move
Always gonna be an uphill battle
Sometimes I'm gonna have to lose
Ain't about how fast I get there
Ain't about what's waiting on the other side
It's the climb
Have you ever been in a moment in which every step forward feels like a step away? That's where you'll find me tonight.
But every away is a toward. And 'every new beginning comes from some other beginning's end.'
Bittersweet transition.
Onward.
