Uncomfortably Comfortable

Through the open windows, the sweet morning sounds of the sparrows, the cicadas, and the passing train ride in on the fresh cool breeze. It is glorious, and I am oh so content. 

Did you catch the key words there? Open windows. Cool breeze. IT'S FALL!!! 

Maybe not officially as the calendar goes, but if we can't wear white anymore, and the kids are back in school, and the pumpkins are beginning to reclaim their prominent position in everything commercial, then it's fall enough for me. And it's my first fall in four years! That's right people, I haven't been in the US for this leaf-changing, cinnamon-scented, chilly-enough-for-a-jacket season since 2008! Oh, how I've missed it...

But now that we've opened up the house, and the temperature has dropped to the 60's for two nights in a row, and Angie's settling into middle school, I'm beginning to worry I'm getting a little too comfortable in this first world.

I started to get concerned when we visited Bolivia a few weeks ago. The weather wasn't nearly as miserably hot as it could have been in August, which rarely obeys the norms for the last "month of winter" that it really is, and usually creeps back into the mid-high 90s. We stayed in the guest room of some missionary friends' lovely home, so we really lacked nothing of consequence. But the buzzing mosquitoes, public transportation, smokey air, shortage of fancy plumbing, and sharing a bed with my daughter instead of my husband started to make me dream of home...

Now that we're back in the states, where autumn will soon paint the trees with the oranges and reds it has saved all year for such a time as this, and even the most humble home has so many luxuries, instead of feeling guilty about having too much, I've decided to feel grateful.

Grateful that this year I can ask the tap for cold or hot water, and it will oblige.

Thankful for the softness of clothes, sheets, and towels fresh from the dryer.

Relieved that I can flush my toilet paper.

Appreciative that I have candy corn, chocolate chips, ranch dressing, Papa John's, Chick-fil-a, and Target at my fingertips.

So glad that opportunities abound for Angie to follow in her mama's footsteps and play tennis to her heart's content.

Giddy because it's football season and my team rocks, even if I'm too cheap to buy tickets to the games now.

Content with the home we can make our own, because it is.

Overjoyed that family surrounds us in all directions.

Many of you have asked how the trip to Bolivia was for Angie. She did great. She enjoyed the things she'd missed, and was ready to return to her new home in Kentucky when our visit was over. Her weakest moment came right after we'd stopped by her old school and her friends had been so ecstatic to see her. 

"I wish we could live in Bolivia again," she thought out loud as we walked back to the house.

"No, you'd miss your grandparents, your cousins, snow, tennis, and you can barely speak Spanish anymore." I teased her. 

"Well, I wish we could have both. Like if Bolivia and the United States were side by side," she motioned with her hands just how close she desired them to be.

Don't we all wish we could have the best of both worlds. I'd prefer the changing seasons of the North mixed with the simplicity of South America. I'd choose the impossible combination of U.S. efficiency and the Latin priority of relationships. I would move all my friends and family from both continents to the same city. And I'd merge my ministries so I could take veterinary students from Santa Cruz, Bolivia and Auburn, Alabama to treat chickens together at an orphanage.

But in the meantime, since life is not a smorgasbord to order from a la carte, I'll choose to focus on all the beauty God gives me every day whether in the colors of the leaves, or the kindness of His people.