Traveling

I absolutely LOVE to travel, or I guess to put that more accurately, I LOVE to reach new places. The process in between is always an interesting one. You begin with the baggage scenario, and when you're going some place for extended periods of time you end up bringing a lot of things back for others, and these days the airlines REALLY don't want you to bring much so they basically charge you your first born child to bring anything. Therefore you're gathered with your family the night before weighing and re-weighing all your bags to be sure they meet the weight requirement. And I've found that ticket counter people can be either the coolest people or the ones who really need a hug. This morning (ehh...or maybe yesterday morning), I dealt with both.

Then you have the whole security debacle, and this time ABQ rocked it and there was literally no line, but then there are places like San Diego where that line goes on for a mile and a half. As you go through that process you have to defrock including shoes, jackets, sweaters, scarfs, and anything metal and even tissues in your pocket. You get to raise your arms above your head as they do a little x-ray and then you wait for the go ahead, grab your stuff, put your clothes back on and get to your gate.

From there you get to try and make sure you're in the general vicinity so you know if anything changes, while trying to also scout out the best place for some refreshments (which again could cost you some vital organ - my coffee and bottled water this morning was about $12). You also try to figure out the wifi status - free wifi is glorious because like right now, it's 10 Euros/hr which is about $20 and you figure out what to do with yourself as you sit there and pray that you don't see those dreaded words of "delayed" or "cancelled" next to your flight number. You then get to play the waiting game and they begin boarding and you strongly consider if it would be worth it to buy an upgrade and always you sigh and decide no - although one day I've promised myself I will do it.

After getting on the plane (and even in the waiting area), you scope everyone out to see what kind of people will be joining you on your journey, you know, how many small children, people speaking foreign languages, etc... That's possibly my most favorite part of the whole traveling process in seeing the different people and watching them and how they interact with those who they came with and even watching those who are by themselves how they handle themselves. I still get a kick out of how you get the flight attendants doing the security things in at least one other language, and right now around me I'm hearing people speaking a menagerie of languages. This world really is so crazy diverse and again it just reminds you about how big our God is and that not one of these people is here on accident.

And then there's the issue of jet lag. Traveling internationally you can get so thrown off on your time. Right now trying to process the time in ABQ, the time in Belgium, and the time in Uganda, well... it's making my head hurt a little bit. You get to be sleep deprived, hungry, sore, and yet with each mile you travel, that's one mile closer to your destination.

Goodbye ABQ

Well, all I can say is this furlough rocked the hisouse! It was such an amazing encouragement and I am in awe of all of the opportunities God gave me to share what He's been doing and what He's fixin' to do with the youth of Uganda. I'm currently in the Washington DC airport (it's funny how airports are where I tend to write a lot of my posts) and I have just said goodbye to a whole LOT of people who I love more than words can say. I hate this time of traveling after saying goodbyes like what happened this morning because it's like you're in such limbo. You ache for those people you just left yet are anticipating what God's got for you at your destination, and as you fly there is such an element of loneliness that you can almost touch. But as I'm spending that time alone, I have some time to just think on how awesome God has been in just caring for me and answering some killer prayers especially over the past couple of days. Everything from provision, to smooth luggage drop off, to comfort, He's been there. I love that He never leaves us, even when you're the only one sitting in the row 30,000 feet in the air I look forward to the fact that within less than 24 hours now I will be in the country that I now call home, and pray for those who I just left in what was my original home.