(warning I wrote this after driving for four days straight I will probably edit it later but I just wanted to get it down now. Thanks for the understanding)
The girls and I just got back from a road trip to California. This journey was a multipurpose journey for us. First it was something asked for and provided by God. We have felt for a while that God was calling us to move to California and it was really scary. Leaving family and home is hard enough but add in the extra stress of not even knowing if you would like it in the place is hard. We prayed that God would let us go and check the place out BEFORE we move and he did. Good news is we LOVE Rancho Cucamonga. The girls commented to me that Rancho seemed comfortable and like home from the very beginning. We can now go from being fearful of what God is leading to being excited about it.
On the nearly 3000 mile one way journey we got to see so much amazing country side. Every state we traveled across had it own vibe to it, they were as diverse as the country side. One part of the journey that seemed particularly long was the desert. While traversing the stretching landscape of the desert God reminded me of the churchy saying, "Well I am in a desert place right now." As a Florida girl when I heard that saying I thought about the old movies where the person got lost in the Sahara and the only thing around them was blowing sand and brown lots and lots of brown. That maybe accurate of some deserts but not the ones I traveled through.
God reminded me that I have been in a desert place since Gary's death. Sort of wandering around not the least bit confident in myself and not sure the direction that I was supposed to travel. God told me pay attention the next few hours and see what it is to be in a desert place. We started out with the big Sahara like sand, hot and no shade and you could almost hear that whistle that you here in cowboy movies when the bad guy comes in.
Then as we traveled on we ran across a water station that someone made up for travelers. They were large tanks that I guess you could give to your animal or fill your car. They were open to anyone. That struck me as interesting. Someone came and made a place for people to get water in the middle of nothingness. Then I thought how many times in my journey has there been a similar refreshment.
As we moved on we started to see these big boulders and as we went the boulders got more plentiful and then they started to be stacked on top of one another. They looked like God had a Jinga set in the middle of the desert. One of the girls commented, "Do you think God made the rocks like that just to make us smile?" We were still in the desert place but in that desert place God was there and he made us smile with his crazy creations.
As we moved on toward California we got a little scarred when out of the corner of our eyes we spotted what looked like a tornado. It took me a minute to calm myself down but then I noticed the beauty of the dancing sand. It looked like a scary tornado at first then they became fascinating to us and we even would try and time it to where they would blow over our car. How many times has something that I thought was terrifying became something cherished since I have been in my desert place?
The sand tornados never went away they were always catching my eye letting me know that even though no one was around that I was not alone. We went from the sand to the giant heavenly Jinga game then we moved into the desert mountains. Again my brain went to the old west movies where there were just a ton of sandy rock mountains but that is far from what it is. The rock is a veritable rainbow of colors. If you look at the rocks you can see the layers of the rock and the history in that rock. That beautiful mountain of rock was not just created it was built season after season through all sorts of climate changes and disasters. Everything that rock went through came together to make something amazingly beautiful.
We still had to journey onward with a few people on the road with us now but not very many folks and when you looked off road a midst the sand tornados and the amazing rock mountains you still didn't see a soul, no houses no businesses (including gas stations) The journey was amazingly beautiful though. The rock mountains showed reds and golds and in one place the brown sand was interrupted by a couple of miles of white sand. At the end of our desert journey we were about to run out of gas. Let me tell you from experience make sure your tank is full because there is no Shell station out there. Near the end I was beginning to ask myself if AAA would make a gas delivery at the cross of a bunch of sand and a bunch of rocks?
I was on E now and there was nothing around and you could see for miles. I got my girls involved, I asked them please oh please pray we make it to a gas station. They did and a few minutes later right outside of Palm springs we ran into a place that had a gas station ( thank GOD) and a Burger King and a T-Rex. Yep you read that right. In the parking lot was a group of Dinos lead by T-Rex. You couldn't help but laugh at the absurdity of the whole thing and how amazingly cute they were. We fueled up the car and us and we moved on into the desert place and eventually the desert faded and we moved onto a mountain top experience and the place we want to move to is in the valley but it is surrounded on all sides by the tall majestic mountains. God reminded me on this journey to find the beauty in whatever place you find yourself to be. People say that God isn't in the desert places. He is you just have to look a little harder to recognize him.
I came out of this trip with a new confidence in myself. I always go back to a word a friend gave me that said I was enough. This trip I had to be enough or we would have failed and I was. Directionally challenged me made it from Florida to California and back with three teenage girls.
I also got a new appreciation for my girls, they were amazing they knew when to leave me alone and stew over traffic and they knew when to tell me funny stories and make me laugh so I wouldn't fall asleep. They encouraged me about the move when they asked, "Can we just stay here in Rancho, I love it here?" Today at the end of the journey they gave me a high five and told me they were proud of me. All three of them are pretty amazing.
tI have had my sac cloth and ashes on for three years now and have wandered around in the desert place missing the beauty of the place I was in. Now I can look back and recognize a lot of the beauty I missed. I look forward to moving forward to a new place and I am going to make sure I stop and look around and appreciate the beauty of whatever comes next. I will move on to the next phase of my life with the knowledge that I am enough and God is there with me whether I am in the desert place or on top of the mountain.
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