No longer at Sea

So it has been two months since we left the ship. The amazing thing already is that almost feels like a lifetime ago. We did a lot of reading on transition and re-entry and I think we were prepared as we were going to be for this period. We are now in Craig, CO (where we lived before joining the ship) and I have accepted a job with the school district for our county.

Here are a few things that have happened in the two months since we left the ship.

- We have lived in three places (with a fourth coming soon).

- We have purchased two cars (one of which had to be returned because it was no good). We also had a car given to us.  I had no idea how much cars cost now or how difficult the process to buy one was going to be.

- We were given smart phones and then purchased another when one of those gifted phones died. Just three months ago I was still typing text messages by hitting a number two or three times and waiting to do the next. I about fell over when I saw someone speak a text message and turn on the TV using their phone. Not to mention learning that traffic is determined by keeping track of the locators on people’s phones.

- After eating on the floor for a few meals in Craig, we now own a table a bookshelf and are borrowing beds and a couch and trying to learn what the value is of other purchases to come.

- I paid for a haircut ☺

Costs are so much different than when we left and we feel kind of like we are just swimming especially when we think about where we just came from. My first culture shock after coming home may have been seeing a Big Mac meal for about $7. I was even caught off guard by the cost of light bulbs since I never had to change one on the ship (we weren’t allowed and had to call the electrician to do it). Everything feels so expensive that we just don’t know what to think about the value of anything anymore.

Another thing that has really caught us off guard is the pace of life. Life feels so fast back here in the US after our four plus years on the ship. Driving places to visit friends and church, going to stores and buying things, cooking and other things all take up so much time. Just a few months ago just about anything we did was done within steps of our home. Schedules here are packed (including ours) and it was difficult to work out when to see people and do things. At times it made our head spin.

In learning about the pace of life, we have also experienced maybe the hardest part of transitioning back to our home culture. That being that life has carried on here for five years while we were gone and we are just trying to catch up to everyone. People have their lives here and just like our friends can’t possibly have the context for what our lives have been like for the last five years from facebook and blog posts, neither can we understand what their lives are now like. When we would visit the US while serving with Mercy Ships, people would want to know about all that we were a part of and would ask a lot of questions. That continued when we first arrived but we were also asking them questions trying to understand what life is now like in this place that we call home but don’t really completely understand anymore. Now the questions about our time with Mercy Ships come much less often and we are still trying to catch up with everyone else and learn what it is like here.

Since we have returned we don’t have much feel for what is happening on the ship or in Benin. We don’t have friends just down the hall to go play a game, invite over for a chat or send our kids to go play with. We have chosen a town to live in, Tracey and I will start new jobs soon, Adalynn will start school soon and there is a new person who will take care of Cora and Jack, who are not in school. It is all happening so fast, that it feels like the last five years are quickly becoming just a memory. I told a friend the other day it is a similar feeling to when I got married. The times I had while single were great but after marriage and kids those times quickly faded and life turned to our new status. It feels like that now, except I was happy to leave singleness behind. Now though we don’t really want to let go of what we were a part of.

We are secure in that we know it was the right time to leave. In all of this transition, we really have had some amazing family time getting to ski and go to parks and the library and playing games with the kids. We have really come together as a family. The kids’ transition has been nothing short of amazing. Our move to Craig and the jobs here really fell in our lap and are confirmation of where the Lord was leading us as we left the ship (more on that later). We are happy to be in Craig in our home church and have been amazingly supported as we moved back to the community. But in all that, we still mourn what we have left behind and we ache for the life we were leading just two short months ago.

Before I start my new job, we will be going to a re-entry debriefing course for a week in Colorado Springs (27 Feb thru 3 March). Mercy Ships paid a significant portion of the cost of that course and while we weren’t sure if we really needed it when it was booked, we are most grateful to have this opportunity now that we have experienced what we are experiencing. Please pray for us and we sort through these feelings over that week and transition back to “normal life” here in the States.

Thank you again for being a part of our journey and we will put out some more updates as we settle back into life here in the US.