When We Admit It: the season we’re in

There’s something really wonderful about bringing a piece of a former world and home into your new one.

Because it’s not just hearts and worlds colliding, but the seasons we’re all in, as well.

The night before they were to leave, Cody and I sat in the living room and sort of admitted to ourselves and each other the seasons we’re in– theirs and ours– different, hard, but real and beautiful in the shadows.

And the beauty of seasons colliding is that it forces honesty and reality out of all of us.

We come together and it’s bits and pieces of us flying around like shrapnel in a storm– but it’s all good.

But when they left after three days, I said things like,

Well, now you’ve seen every facet of stress in my life.

Thanks for loving on our crazy boys, even when they pull your hair.

I sit on my couch in the quiet of the late afternoon and drink the coffee I started this morning, and I admit with my heart that this is my season and lot, and I admit that it’s hard.

And all four of us are on the brink of something– jobs, relationships, school, child-rearing, faithfulness in marriage, joy in the adventure.

We saw it in each other’s presence, and while we all long for the future things, this weekend taught us that the present– hard, complicated, unexplainable, and beautiful– the present is where we need to be, where Jesus is and where His voice speaks wonders and promises not yet understood.

We laughed and drank coffee, we gutted out our hearts like we gut out a pumpkin before the hard work of carving begins, and by the end we are released from burdens and we breathe deeper than before. We smile and we say a million thanks– thanks for loving me in my parenting failures; thanks for being okay with husky hair all over you; thanks for the hugs; thanks for the tears; thanks for the beer and sweet conversation; thanks for understanding; thanks for loving the honesty in us that just can’t be hidden or covered up, no matter how hard we try.

Once again, it’s the story of humanity–

We are not alone.

Every season, struggle, forced smile and deep sigh–

We are not alone.

Maybe it takes a 700 mile trek and a few days of tender craziness and companionship to realize it, but there we have it, and we wander on in peace and in assurance–

In our seasons, we are not alone.