i need some small adventures

This weekend I booked my one-way flight to Beirut, Lebanon. The count down until my average adult life, with normal job, rent, groceries, responsibilities, etc transforms to 3 + months of travel, exploration, and new experiences is 108 days. (4 months didn't feel so long...it feels longer now that I know the day count). I've had the dull bug the past week, ready for that end of August change that has been around as long as I can remember (probably since I went to preschool 20 years ago). Knowing that I have to wait another 108 days for that change is not very exciting.... 

....true... true... it's a bit of a wait. But what an exciting adventure it will be. Exploring places so important to the world, to your story, to the modern worlds religions and cultures and conflicts. Lebanon, Turkey (TURKEY!), Jordan, Palestine/Israel, and Ireland....

And yet, I need to live the next four months. Focused on Richmond, and my friends, and my roommates, and my job (though not overly focused on my job), and my grad school applications. And I need to invest a deal of energy into making these next 108 days great, full and wonder-filled. To take the small adventures, to wonder at the joy that is life here and now, to find amazement in the 
ordinary. 

With that spirit, I dragged Matt and Rachel adventuring to Bear Creek Lake on a Spontaneous Summer Sunday Sortee. Desperate for some exploring, we took a picnic by the lake and then rented kayaks for an hour. Turtles, a silent and cool creek, sun beating off the lake, ice cream, and an afternoon of reading. 

Maybe I can plan the little adventures into my fall - to make sure that I'm ready for a big one in 108 days. 

Comments

  1. JoshuaSeptember 4, 2015 at 4:32 AM

    Sounds like a busy couple of months for you! Excited to hear about your trip to Turkey - you will have to tell us where to go!

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

A Reflection on Mothering

The second Sunday of May. May 13, 2012. International Mothers Day. My planner tells me it is celebrated in USA, CAN, AUS, NZL. Very international. (note the sarcasm).  I have noticed mother's day come and go several times. I pride myself on never forgetting the culturally mandatory, and always rewarding, phone call to my mother, even when she is across the globe. Often I call my grandmother and single aunt as well - they too have been mothers in my life.  This year, however, I was struck by how Mother's Day, with it's focus on gift giving and flowers designed both to empower the economy and praise feminine domesticity, losses sight of the character of mothering.  I celebrated Mother's Day with "The House of Peace," a church community run through Fourth Street Community Fellowship (Virginia Mennonite Conference) for the impoverished and homeless of inner city Washington, D.C. In honor of thee occasion, Rev. Sang Jin Choi asked members to share test...
Read more

change

read this : http://www.thesimpleway.org/resources/details/50-ways-to-become-the-answer-to-our-prayers/. I did. And while I knew it was a call to change, I kept checking off all the things I already do. I hate that somehow, in my mind, the few things on that list I have done or do, like laughing at advertisements or writing someone in prison, seem to justify my fears of actually sacrificing something to make a difference. Here, at this point in my life, when I have all the time in the world, I read that list and check off the things I did at school without thinking of the things I could do here and now, in my lonely existence. I know full well that my sadness and my loneliness have to do with having nothing to be passionate at the moment, having nothing to keep me in love with the world. And yet, I don't know how I can adapt the list of simple, radical living, to inspire me today to make a difference. I'm not sure how I can be the answer to prayers in this place while I continue...
Read more

hippie me

I made a decision the other day. A friend of mine encouraged me to be proud of how I spend my time this summer, to plan things to look forward to, and in many ways to enjoy life. For awhile now I've waited on God to change this summer, and somehow I've forgotten that I have hands, feet, a heart, and a brain to change it too. And so I set out to make a list, a list that will bring joy, encouragement, and excitement to me as well as others. In many ways it's a simple list, consisting of smiling, leaving random notes of encouragement, and caring a trash bag around town to pick up the worlds litter. However, this list is helping me to find the passion for life that I felt I might have left at school in Virginia. Being so far from the God-loving, hippie culture of the past year is forcing me to come to terms with how I can love God's world and Her people in my own way. And this time, doing things like not-washing my hair, washing my clothes by hand, and building calluses on ...
Read more