looking backwards and forwards

It had been my intention when I began this blog a year ago to just document our year in Maryland and then call it quits. However, as is so often the case, I have since discovered some things about myself and about life in general that have made me rethink that idea.

In writing this blog and through a couple of other projects I'm working on, I have discovered that I actually don't mind like really enjoy writing. As someone who didn't like English class much in high school or college, this came as a surprise to me. Of course, it shouldn't have since other interests have changed over the years- for example, I also really like history now and I just tolerated it in school. I embrace the challenge of making it interesting or entertaining to the reader but more than that, the effort of articulating a thought or idea without hand gestures or made-up words ("thingamajig" is a favorite as I try to point to or gesture what I'm talking about...) invigorates me.

The thought processes involved in writing have brought me to a more intimate relationship with Christ. It is not an accident or coincidence that Scripture comes to mind as I write this blog. Or that in the hindsight of writing about an experience I can more clearly see God working in and through that experience.

Obviously, it is true that simply writing a personal journal would achieve both personal enjoyment and a more intimate relationship with Christ... and I have tried to keep a journal numerous times. After a few weeks I forget, get busy or don't think I have anything to say (which is really an excuse for being lazy). I need the accountability of a blog... and the possibility that someone might be waiting to read the next blog post. I personally follow several blogs and feel a little disappointed when I have to wait "too long" to read, as Paul Harvey used to say, "the rest of the story."

I have realized that you don't have to be on a permanent vacation or have young children to see and do interesting or fun things. I had become too much of a "home body" after our children grew up and left home. It was just easier to stay home than it was to find things to see and do and go do them. After a year of being on the go, interacting with new people and experiencing new cultures, foods and events all within 25 miles of our home in Maryland, I am convinced that there are equally unique and fun things to do right here in the Valley of the Sun. So... my ongoing mission is "to explore strange new worlds, to seek out new life (people) and new civilizations (places), to boldly go where no man (or at least me) has gone before!"