In 2006, my youngest graduated from high school and I decided to go back to work. I looked for a job all spring, thinking I would go back to work that summer. I kept on looking into the summer, interviewed a couple of times, but still had no job when fall came. I really wanted to be working when school started in the fall, to help with college tuition. I finally got the call back for the job I started in November of that year; the call to work at a law firm in the greater Nashville, TN area. My girlfriend from church worked in the same building, and she's the one who told me about the job. It was a newly created position and would eventually expand to be much more. Even at the beginning, the job was very different from what I imagined it would be. But I was learning and I was back in the work world after almost 20 years. I figured I'd stay at least 4 years, if they'd have me and contribute sufficiently to my kids' college education.
On Monday, our staff all went to lunch to honor my departure. Four attorneys, an accounts person, a receptionist and the lady I'm training to replace me. It's been a great place to work and I've learned a tremendous amount while there. Even more than most college degrees could have taught me, and I'm very, very thankful for the opportunity.
My daughter is now married and my son is engaged. So that brings me to next week.
I will no longer be employed by the law firm, but will be in......wait for it......Guatemala!
On a foreign missions trip! My last day is Thursday and the flight for Miami leaves Saturday morning. Not exactly the two weeks of vacation I've been waiting for, for the last couple of years. I haven't had a whole week off since about 2007.
But with the trip to Central America, and all the accompanying miracles that go along with my actually being able to participate in this adventure (that's another blog altogether!) I will tell you about my plans for the next week.
Our mission team will arrive Saturday afternoon and make our way to the mountain region where we will be staying. A sweet man with no home will hopefully have one when we leave the following weekend. Countless children should be given some kind of medical care and encouragement. Moms and dads will look at our fair skinned American complexions and smile. And I will (I pray) get to see some awesome wool at a world famous market. I have an issue of Wild Fibers magazine that highlights the weavers of the country and their patterns, specific to their regions; kind of like Scottish plaids.
I will be taking my spindle and some knitting but probably not the purple sweater. It's on metal needles and I don't want them confiscated. Instead, I'll take the UFO - Stony River socks on bamboo dpns.
It is a lifelong dream of mine to do mission work and I had given up that dream long, long ago. I can still hardly believe I'm going. We had a commissioning prayer the other night and I headed home in a daze. The Lord is sometimes slow in answering our prayers; sometimes He even takes 25 or 30 years to answer them. But He does indeed answer them.