The Full Story

As I stated in my first post, our family began this journey many months ago when we learned that our friends were moving. It was at that time that we started putting things in motion to make this transition.

You see, my husband began using his musical and technical gifts and talents to help our local church nearly six years ago. Since then, he has slowly shifted to doing this full time. It has been an amazing thing to watch God work in him and through him to impact other people.

Serving in the church full time is clearly where God wants him to be. He’s good at it. He’s a better husband, dad, friend and person because of it.

Serving in ministry is not a high-paying job, and we were used to living a certain way and having a little extra spending money each month. Supporting my husband and his new found purpose meant we were going to have to sacrifice.

Before moving, I was commuting 45 minutes one way and working a lot of over time. I loved my job and had no plans to change, but I also knew that I was missing out on my kid’s lives and carving out time to hang out with my husband felt like work. Something had to give but it wasn’t going to be my job.

When our friends told us that they were moving to a small town in Texas to start a new church, we both wanted to entertain the idea of helping them. But how could we possibly do this? Where would I work? How would we pay our huge student loan bills on a small-town salary?

The answer became clear one afternoon while speaking with one of my mentors.

I would present a work-from-home scenario to my employer and a new, much-needed position that could be done from home. For weeks, I worked on a written proposal and practiced what I would say to my boss when the opportunity presented itself to pitch my far-fetched idea.

I wasn’t sure what the reaction would be from my company. I did expect to be met with a lot of red tape and obstacles. Would they allow me to keep my benefits? Would there be a lot of technology that I would need to purchase?

What I didn’t expect was for my boss and my company to be open and even eager to help me make this idea a reality. During the entire process, I felt calm and relaxed that everything would work out the way it was supposed to. Again, this is not like me. It was as if I was on some trial anxiety medication that worked like a dream.

In a few short months, I went from working and commuting more hours a week than I care to admit to working from home and having a 30 second commute (I take my purse with me to the “office” attached to my house).

As if having an out-of-body experience, I have watched this grand plan that could have only be orchestrated by God Himself play out over the last 10 months (in retrospect, some things leading up to this have been in the works for years).

Some of the events that have transpired to make this move a reality have been small miracles. Seriously. If someone had told me two years ago that I would be working from home, my husband would be doing ministry full-time and that we would be living in a small, rural community, I would have laughed hysterically.

There is no other explanation for how we got to where we are today aside from the fact that a God who loves us and wants the best for us has a plan for the people in this area and wanted us to play a part in it.

Maybe this is our purpose…to bring the light of the world to this rural part of Texas.

The Fridge Debacle

We moved into our rent home far away from many modern conveniences on a Tuesday. By Thursday, it was obvious our refrigerator wasn’t working. While the AC repair man was checking why our AC wasn’t working (that is a post for another day!), I asked him if he could check the temp in our fridge with his temp gauge. “It doesn’t seem to be cooling ma’am,” stated the courteous AC repair man. Perfect. Luckily, we hadn’t even had time to go grocery shopping since officially moving in.

A quick trip to the gas station and everything worth saving was in a cooler and on ice. In my old life, I would have had a plethora of options for solving this inconvenient problem. But, I was in a new, foreign place. Out of sheer pity, the AC repairman gave me a few leads, but no one could help me. Recalling seeing some paperwork about the appliance upon moving in, I dug around and found some helpful docs. Sears! They have a Sears!

The next day, a Sears repairman came to the house to inform us that a very crucial part had to be replaced. He would have to order the part and it would be at least 5 days until he got it in. Five days without a fridge? How much is the part and repairs going to cost? Okay, deep breaths.

We are renting this home and the fridge appears to be less than two years old. I begin chatting with the repairman knowing that complaining isn’t going to get the thing fixed faster. Seeing the panic on my face and probably realizing that my AC was also on the fritz, he makes a few calls and discovers that the fridge is under warranty. He gives me everything I need so that the home owner can claim the repair on the plan she purchased through Sears. One of the many benefits of living in a small town: going the extra mile for your neighbor.

It took 12 days for our fridge to get up and running again but it didn’t cost us a penny. Had this happened in the town where we used to live, I’m quite certain it would have been fixed faster, but I seriously doubt my repairman would have gone to all that trouble to make sure I didn’t have to pay for the repairs.

And, that’s a trade off I’m willing to live with.

And So the Journey Begins...

At the urging of some friends, I have started a blog to chronicle our family’s recent switch in our surroundings, routines and perspectives on life.

Recently, our family moved from a suburb near a large city where we had spent the last six years entrenching ourselves in the community. We built our dream home and planned to stay until the kids graduated from high school. Our daughter was born four years ago and that was the only place she knew. I was heavily involved in the PTA, my husband and I both served at our local church, our children were loved by so many people and our son, a 10-year-old math and science genius, was attending a special program.

All that changed when we learned our very best friends were moving away to start something that we knew we wanted to be a part of. My gut told me that we had to follow them. This line of thinking was irrational and not like me. I couldn’t help but notice that anytime I spoke of this possible life switch, my eyes lit up and my insides sparkled. Nothing about this crazy idea seemed crazy when I vocalized our plans aloud. How could this be?

Following this line of thinking meant uprooting our family and everything we knew and moving to a small town with very few job prospects and even fewer things to do for fun.

And that’s exactly what we did.

I hope that you will consider joining me on this journey of self discovery as I learn what it’s like to trade in my big city dreams for small town bliss.