Something you know but don’t really think about when you leave on the Race is that you will miss your family. You will miss birthdays, anniversaries, weddings, births, funerals. You are mostly aware of all of this as you sign up but let’s face it, these all fade when you focus on the fact that God is calling you on a worldwide journey!
Until you are gone.
You miss the first thing and it isn’t to bad. Then the second is a little worse but you have still had random Skype dates and been chatting when you can. Most of the time it is fine, no worries; you miss people and events but God is amazing and someday you will go home. And then the holidays come closer.
For me the whole month of November was harder. Two of my siblings celebrate their birthday’s in November and Thanksgiving in my family is a big deal. Al of the Aunts, Uncles, and cousins come together for a week of food, family, fun-filled-frivoloties, and more food.
This year was even bigger because my older sister is engaged and her fiancé got to join this insanity. As the month passed by slowly I realized what I was missing more and more. As everyone else counted down the days to Thanksgiving I got weepier and weepier.
By Thanksgiving week we were back in Kathmandu and I regularly tried to catch my family on Skype-with absolutely no success. Wednesday was our last day in Nepal and when I couldn’t connect that morning I gave up. I laid my attachments to my family, my hopes of seeing them on my little screen, and a few tears on the table and walked away.
We caught a late night flight from Kathmandu to Qatar for a layover. As we wait, people start to pull out their devices and we all realize that they are filled with the sweet nectar of free wi-fi, even better, a God connection. I quickly send off a quick message to one of my sisters telling her to get online because the connection might be good enough to see one anothers face.
As I wait with no answer disappointment starts to seep through me, like dye dropped into water, slowly tainting my body with its sweetly curling tendrils. And then I heard the bells of heaven, and an incoming Skype call. Just past 2 a.m. in Qatar on Thanksgiving day and I finally got that call in with my family…as they were eating dinner. I got to glimpse a handful of pixilated cousins, aunts, and uncles and spent nearly 40 minutes with my siblings and parents. I didn’t have my normal Thanksgiving with my family. I spent most of it in an airport or on an airplane with my World Race family. I did get a smidgen of time with my real family, but even with that God reminded me of one of my constant lessons: my identity is not in my family who loves me. It is in my God who loves me enough to give me my family, both blood and Race.
