Tag: moving

I’m happy I can’t see the future

because I would most certainly screw things up if given the chance. This morning I was thinking about how we “should have been” back in the US by now, our year in Egypt completed, and on to our next duty station. Instead I’m driving around Muscat trying to find black dress pants for Calvin’s middle school choir concert tonight, baking a dessert for Carter’s classroom party, planning a trip to Dubai over Christmas vacation, and we still have another lovely 6 months stretched out in front of us before we move on to the next place. (Enshalla)

But if I could have seen the future a year ago I would have been completely traumatized by the idea of being uprooted, going back to the US, then back overseas, the decision to put the kids in school . . . if you had given me the choice up front, I wouldn’t have chosen this path. Even the promise of a good result wouldn’t have been worth it to me back then.

But we have seen amazing things come from our crazy year. Being back at my parents’ house, while frustrating at the time because we had no idea what would happen next, was a wonderful two months where we were completely embraced and loved by them, by people at their church, people from our church, and complete strangers who went out of their way to help us out. And to be home for my sister’s wedding was a once in a lifetime opportunity. I will always be thankful for the revolutionaries who generated my plane ticket home — even though I left the country kicking and screaming on the inside.

And our opportunity to come to Oman? If it had been up to me I would have chosen to return to Egypt, curfews and all. And that would have been the wrong choice. Even though there are plenty of times when I miss our life there, I know we are in the right place for us. Really, if we were moved to Egypt tomorrow, I’d have a long, long list of things I would miss about Oman.

Tomorrow marks exactly 6 months until the last day of school and June 13th is the beginning of our next “unknown.” We know we’ll be moving, but we don’t know where. And the fact that I can’t pick the place (or even the country) is a good thing. Wherever we’re assigned, I know God will provide. I’ll just hold on and try to enjoy the ride.


good news, better news, best news

Several great things happened today, but I’ll let you decide on the good/better/best part because I can’t pick my favorite. First the bad news. I woke up this morning with my eye swollen almost shut. Again. At least this time I had one good eye to see out of. Later on today when the swelling went down some, we could see that I had a bite of some sort right on the corner of my eye. My bet is on one of the many minuscule ants that I see in our bathroom every now and then. I also have a few huge welts from some other bug on my shoulder and back — I’m guessing mosquitos for those. :sigh:

But I woke up to Josh’s parents in our house! Their flight came in at 4 this morning so Josh picked them up before he left for school. We had a fun breakfast and chatted for a while before and after the kids headed off on the bus and then they headed upstairs to take a much needed nap.

Meanwhile, another part of the good news was unveiled. Art and Barbara brought my new toy — a MacBook Air. I had always said I could never justify paying 4xs the amount for a Mac when the PC version was perfectly adequate, but I finally caved and had it shipped from Amazon to their house right before they left so they could bring it over (they’re still selling the 2010 version here at a higher price than the 2011 in the US).

ugly puffy eye, pretty new computer

So I opened it up and started playing around with it — I LOVE that it automatically found and set up my wireless network. Usually I have to wait until Josh is around and have him do it for me. It is already proving to be a good fit. I loved my netbook, but I always ended up saving things on my desktop because if I let the computer pick the location, I could never find them again. They say “once you go Mac, you never go back,” so we’ll see if it lives up to the hype. I haven’t spent much time on it because my puffy eye started making me feel tired (probably the combo of the antihistamine and having to work to keep my eye open) so I gave up and took a long, long nap (4 hours).

Meanwhile Lucy made dinner and played with the baby and managed the house so I didn’t have to worry about a thing while I slept. I woke up to find Lucy gone and Josh home with the news that our time here has been extended until the boys finish the school year. Our 12 months is up in April and we were trying to figure out how we could get the boys through until the end of the school year . . . but Josh asked, and we received! No news yet on where we’ll be moving to, but Josh has requested Bahrain. Otherwise it will be somewhere in the states, hopefully West coast.

A puffy eye photo is coming as soon as I can figure out how to get photos from my computer to my blog. As easy as the Mac system is, I still need a for Dummies book.

(it’s amazingly skinny!)

flying high

I was going through old drafts on my blog, looking for Turkey stuff when I found this. I think I was originally going to do a post about our flight/trip to Oman, but it got lost in all the chaos of landing in country and finding our way around.

I forgot how quiet those lemons kept her — I wonder if I need to pack some for our trip to Jordan in a few weeks?

A Story of Four Continents

not quite as catchy as Charles Dickens, but not nearly as wordy either. Today marks six months that we’ve been in Oman. We’re now halfway through our year overseas. In October of last year we were making our final preparations for our move to Egypt, never imagining that a year later we would be living on an entirely different continent instead.

While traveling in Istanbul, Calvin pointed out that he has now traveled to four continents: North America (home), Africa (Egypt), Asia (Oman), and Europe (Istanbul). I added that not only have we been to four continents, but we’ve been to four continents this year. To further compress that, we left Africa on February 1st, spent the next two months in North America, moved to Asia on March 31st, and arrived in Europe on July 27th. A four continent tour in less than 6 months.

And now it’s time to start thinking about our next move. Oh my.