The ride of faith.

"Fifty years from now, when you’re looking back at your life, don’t you want to be able to say you had the guts to get in the car?"

-Sam to Mikaela in Transformers.

even all these years later, we’re still talking about the faith it takes to get out of the boat and ride the waves (walk on water).

Baggage

And love
It’s not the easy thing
The only baggage
That you can bring
Not the easy thing
The only baggage you can bring
Is all that you can’t leave behind
-U2

so they lost my luggage somewhere in the Minneapolis aiport.   as of a few hours ago, it was still lost.   it was a bit zoo-ey there yesterday, that for certain but still it’s been well over 24 hours.

When we flew down to Seattle on Friday to shop for "dresses" (and it’s fair to say, we shopped until we dropped - literally), after quite a crazy start in Fairbanks with flights canceled etc, we sat waiting for our baggage for over 45 minutes.   Finally someone over the speaker announced that our baggage would be arrived shortly on the carousel.  They had found it in a back corner somewhere on a trolley.   Highly entertaining - we thought - I mean what airline/airport actually admits that over a loudspeaker????

so tonight - another night without my baggage - but you know, today was ok without it.   And so I sit here wondering if I really need what’s in it (want it, sure, but need it ?)  I sit here wondering, what else could I leave behind?   what else do I not need? 

baggage, we’ve all got it.  we carry it around from day to day, relationship to relationship, city to city.

baggage, we all could do to loose some of it for certain.  we could all do with a lighter load - a little less baggage, maybe?

and I’m sure there are some days when we wish  (and our friends) that our baggage would simply get lost.   Or overlooked in some little corner of life.   

but maybe what’s most important isn’t what we leave behind but what we bring with us.   

so maybe Bono has it right,  it’s not easy.   
"but the only baggage you can bring, is all that you can’t leave behind."

interestingly enough, I just got a call, they’ve found my baggage and it’s on its way home.   

the call

so at 8am everyday and at various other times through out the day, this horn blows in Christy’s neighborhood.   I finally asked yesterday exactly what this daily hourly ocassion was.

this man blows his "shofar" regularly throughout the day as he prays over his neighborhood and city. 

hmmm.   just like church bells.   just like the monastery bells.   just like the ram’s horn in the Hebrew temple.   

Seven times a day do I praise you, says the Psalmist. 

Even here on the edge of the world, the "shofar" blows reminding us that God is indeed in our midst.   calling us to prayer, to communion with our God.

it seems somethings are just written into our design.   

somethings just don’t die.  And what a relief that is.

I praise you for a I am fearfully and wonderfully MADE. - Psalm 139. 

Thank you.  Thank you for the grand design that doesn’t fade, that doesn’t whither, that doesn’t die, that lives on through generations and across the lands.       

it’s all about the ride! (once again).

so we drove up to Chena Hot Springs yesterday evening…  how cool is that!

but life got ohhh so much cooler on the way back.

life is so about the ride!  so about the WAY home …  I don’t need to do anything … the hot springs were fantastic but the ride home - priceless!!!!!!!!

I said in the car after we passed another scene that totally left me breathless: this is the most beautiful ride I’ve ever had in Alaska.  And Chirsty laughing goes: Sally, I love you because every where we go in Alaska is the most beautiful one.

What can I say …  life is beautiful!  It does seem to me that each day holds more beauty than the last.  after all we’re on step closer to home.  and up here in Alaska, home seems like it’s right round the corner! 

Weddings.

So we’ve learned something.   not sure exactly why it is so, but none-the-less, weddings like other big beautiful (even if they are simple and small and quick) occasions seem to bring out everybodies issues (especially if you’re related).   Somehow weddings and the like seem to remind us of places of pain, regardless of what it looks like on the surface: control, jealously, desire…

perhaps this is indeed the heart behind the notion that "everybody has an opinion.  everybody knows how it should be done." 

people are funny,no doubt.   weddings just highlight it all.

so now I begin to pray that perhaps this wedding in particular might end up a place of healing, a place where stones may roll and new life is given, and not just for Kyle and Christy.

56 down.

44 more to go.

moose tracks.

so I’m about to go to sleep.   

tonight I’m going to sleep with thoughts of moose dancing in my head.   Hoping that by some chance, I’ll wake in the night and find one nibbling at the tree outside my window.  my bed is under this window, obviously making a moose sighting even more exciting a prospect. 

you see this morning we walked out back onto Christy’s deck and she said "look moose tracks."  I looked a bit perplexed cause I couldn’t find any place for there to be a "track" to see ( no mud etc).   So she pointed at the trail of flattened bushes, weeds, small trees and long grass that moved through the trees immediatly off her deck and ran up the hill.   clearly, moose tracks.   

so tonight I go off to sleep hoping and wishing and praying that Mr. Moose might find his way around to this side of the house and peer upon my window. 

I mean who needs to count sheep in Alaska when there’s moose!

I love Alaska.

and apparently according to Christy, I can legitimately say that I love Alaska now because I’ve been here in all seasons and temperatures.   I’ve seen snow and ice and negative double digits with the three hour sunrises and long shadows all day .   I’ve seen the fireweed starting to bloom and it 90+ degres with 22 hours of daylight and only dusk in between..    And now I’ve seen the fireweed almost to the end of it’s blooms and summer almost done with sunset at midnight.   

and I love Alaska!!!!!   I love Alaska.   I love the trees.  I love the mountains.  I love that there is slim picking for tuxedo rentals (as I learned today at dinner).  I love that it’s August and I can sit out on the deck and breathe without breaking a sweat.   I love that today I could see  the rain pour over one part of fairbanks but remain totally dry where I was.   I love the little coffee drive-thru’s that are on every corner.  I love the wilderness.   I love that it feels like I’m at the edge of the world (the top of the world - almost literally) and heaven is right next door.    

and I love that Christy, my dearest friend lives here.   

so be it known that I, Sally Chambers is on holiday.  I am on retreat.

   

in Alaska!

   

the extended birthday.

  so I’ve always loved extending the birthday.   I mean why should I only celebrate me one day a year -why not a whole weekend; why not a whole week … and my personal favorite, let’s just make the entire month of August: my birthday! 

But I will say that this year I’ve taken "extended birthday"  to a whole new level this year … extended not only in day and time, but extended in terms of miles … 4013.28 miles (that would be 67 hours, 53 minutes according to mapquest)…

that’s a pretty darn good extension on the birthday if you ask me!

and the funny thing is … we’re still talking about how to celebrate my birthday here in Alaska - not sure if we have decided on anything exactly yet - so I guess it’s extended even further.

leaping

Either God will give you the ground to land on or the wings to fly.   

the gift of community?  sometimes you get to see the wings.   

thanks Sean.