We left our VRBO home in the morning to head back to Seward. For four nights we enjoyed spacious yet cozy accommodations. On the inside it looked like a log cabin in the woods. With the seven of us, two hotel rooms is pretty much a necessity. With six of us we can still make it work when you find a place with two queen beds and pull-out sofa. With the house there were enough beds for almost each child to have their own.

The way back was uneventful. We emptied the fridge of the remaining food we’d collected over the week for our picnic lunch at the beach, the time we ordered pizza, and the one night when we cooked. To take everyone out to eat averaged $150 for a sit down place. We didn’t stop for a meal and used the remaining food to manage for lunch. Dad and the kids walked to McDonalds for supper tonight and spent around $70.

I wasn’t hungry until they came back. They had already had the conversation about guarding against Mom stealing their fries. Josh asked me on their way out if I was sure, if I wanted any fries and I said no. I was prepared to live with my choice even as my daughter’s chicken sandwich revealed to me that I probably could have eaten something. I was saving room for dessert to meet some friends who’d recently moved.

She was a junior counselor with me at camp. Her husband is now an assistant professor at the university and they’ve only been living there about a month. She reached out to me yesterday mentioning their recent move and saying we’d come to her mind. Isn’t that something? I told her we’d be in Seward the next day, and that Ethan was a student there returning for his sophomore year. We hung out for two hours and they all played.

They have four kids a little younger, but they remembered each other from camp. They are a wonderful Lutheran family who will make a great addition to the community and I anticipate and pray that the community will also be a blessing to them and for continuously growing children. Her sister lives very close to us and recently had a baby. It’s been on my mind to contact her. The high school kids missed their first day today.

Mountain isn’t the right word, but it’s the one I keep using. The Rockies are mountains, the Appalachians are mountains. They don’t have anything like that here. What they have here are mounds of barren rock, some reaching heights that are frighteningly tall. I keep trying to figure out what the landscape is missing and I’ve not been able to put my finger on it. More trees? Colors? I’ve never seen anything like this before.

This morning we visited a local LCMS church. They have three Lutheran churches in this town: ELCA, Wisconsin synod, and LCMS. The church we visited, we were told, has five retired pastors as part of its membership. Today they had a guest pastor and did Divine Service three. On the bulletin board was a missionary letter from a couple we knew a short time during seminary. Both of us were pregnant and due with our first babies.

After that we went back to Sylvan Lake, which is the same place they have the trail entrances for hikes. This time though we went to the beach. It wasn’t packed or overly crowded, though the parking lots again were full. They have hikes you can do around the lake which we did about halfway just to see what was over there. The kids saw a man who was naked changing his clothes. I turned around but Dad said it was okay.

The old house sold in less than two days. It’s fine and I’m glad that it wasn’t a big hassle. If we had more money we’d have bought it ourselves. It could’ve been a nice home base for the kids with their town and school activities. It was such a great house for being so close to things. The high school, the grade schools, the churches, the stores.

Our mountain climb began around 8:45. For whatever reason it didn’t quite fit my mental image of what mountains are supposed to look like up close, or how big they are supposed to appear in the distance. It was Black Elk Peak which is the highest point in South Dakota and also east of the Rockies until you get to somewhere in Spain.

The kids timed everything on their running watches. The rounded split times for the miles going up were 24, 27, 30, and 36 minutes. It was only supposed to be 3.5ish miles up so I’m not sure where the extra half mile came from. Going down was more like 28, 28, 28, 10. At the top we sat in a shaded ledge, ate our snacks, and took in the view.

Today we traveled to see Mt. Rushmore. There is a scenic route you can take which is longer in miles and requires you to drive slower but it was well worth the extra time. The route contained multiple viewings of the monument, each time with the faces getting bigger and bigger. A highlight was definitely seeing it for the first time after Elianna spotted it from the middle back seats.

The four presidents displayed 0n the monument are (L to R) George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Theodore Roosevelt, and Abraham Lincoln. Each president represents something significant about our nation’s history. Washington represented the foundation of a new country. Jefferson represented the expansion of it through the Louisiana Purchase. Roosevelt represented the conservation, and I don’t remember the word with Lincoln. It had to do with the unifying of the states.

I enjoyed it very much and would recommend it to others. There is a .6 or so mile loop around the area where you can walk and get a closer view. There are two small movie theatres where you can watch a short history about the monument’s construction, along with the normal tourist attraction things like a gift shop and book store. The path into the park is lined with all of the state flags.

(Photo: Mt. Rushmore)

I open my eyes to cup of coffee on the hotel nightstand. I know that my husband, whose shower I can hear through the wall, is the one who has placed it there. This registers as positive points. Later in the morning I sit down on the bed and say to him, “Listen, everything you do it is being filtered and sorted into one of two categories in the recesses of my mind: 1) Okay, he does love me, and 2) He doesn’t care at all.

This sorting, I have figured out, is really going on at all times, but only now am I truly conscious of it. For the past two days I have been hurting with thoughts in my head that number two is winning out. The night before last was the worst. I unleash my pain and sudden fury in a series of texts. A man who loves a woman need not be begged to give attention, needs no direct and repetitive asking for what she needs on a regular basis.

I am right, and if he would simply concede, if he could find the truth in my words and know, to understand, their true desperation. I have never known a creature, this one they call “man”, to so much lack such a natural sympathy, to be able to cause such pain to women, and at the same time, have no capacity to comfort them in any of it. I know I’ve gone too far somewhere and I do apologize, for the suddenness, for the method.

Just get down here and hold me, you stupid fool. I don’t say the last part. I have no interest in giving in to his direction. He will hold me and I will cry this out in his arms. And I know my limits. I can do this if the complaints, if the pain and bitterness I harbor has to do with anything else except for him. He comes down to where I am and I can see he’s trying. I cry it out, relieved, yet remain quiet and depressed the entire next day.

But that’s all in the past now. Today I felt better, though still baffled by these repeated pains that come upon me. We leave Seward, Nebraska to make the second leg of our trip to Custer, South Dakota. We pass the day in peace, with the suspense gradually building with the change of the landscape from plains into bluffs. For the most part I read, grateful to have a book to keep me busy as we ride. I find a woman in the story.

The kids and I went to the car wash this morning. I wanted both the vehicles vacuumed out but they don’t let you use the vacuums without a membership or first purchasing a car wash. A couple of weeks ago one of the boys and I went to find a vacuum for the van. I pulled up and asked a lady who was also there with her car where we were supposed to pay.

She said it was free. I couldn’t imagine how something like that could be free nowadays but we went ahead and vacuumed it out. Later I came back and told everyone about this car wash place we’d found where you could get free vacuuming. My husband was like, “I think you have to have a membership first” and of course he was right. But today they were having twelve-dollar Tuesday where you can get the most expensive wash done plus the free vacuuming.

So that’s what we did. I don’t know why I never thought to take the kids to something like this when they were little. We could’ve had such a fun tradition that when things got hairy at home and everybody was going stir-crazy we just hopped into the van and drove to the car wash. It would’ve mesmerized them surely and we wouldn’t have even had to go in anywhere.

They said they used to do this with Grandma. I had no idea but I was very happy to hear this. So they all knew what to do when we came out of the laugh-inducing washing tunnel and there were enough vacuum hoses around so that everyone could help. I felt like a civilized adult having a vacuumed out car. The boys drove home with one and then Elianna and I continued on to Walmart. I felt like I needed a couple of shirts in addition to cat food and things.

Then we stopped by Aldi to get snacks. Later this afternoon we all went to the Athens track for the boys to run their 4×400. No one was able to find the baton so they used a hammer handle. They shaved around 20 seconds off of last year’s time. After that I took a nap and then wanted to swim to help my joints. Dad came with. It was early enough to still swim in the sun.

I don’t know what is going on. I’m tired of writing about my life in this way, these endless mazes lost inside my own thoughts while all the while the mind of God goes so unexplored. I get these urges to leave and don’t know how to discern them. My heart hurts and I no longer want to share any more of it. I can use this blog for quotes that I like, or songs I come across. I will write where I can here but please don’t expect things.

We’ve been tying up loose camp and household ends before our trip. The field needed mowed, the boys needed haircuts. I went for a walk and found Elianna on the retreat center deck talking to Miles. They’ve been going through Bible books, first Galatians and now Titus. His school is one of the first stops on our trip, two vehicles driving out with one of returning college things.

I’ve not put any energy into getting his room sorted out or things ready. Laura is here today before she heads back to school and they were going to pack and clean up in there. The boys have returned from the outside to find snacks. Dad is in the office getting ready to be away. I am taking a moment before starting on supper. Meatball subs, salad, corn on the cob, and whatever else. The temps are cooler.

We traveled once more to St. Louis this morning. My sister-in-law’s installation took place during the late service. The church’s parking lot is currently under construction which necessitated a detour to the parking garage across the street. There were no regular spots so we ended up parking in one of probably twelve of more handicapped spaces. We met Uncle Glenn at the hotel in town where my mother-in-law had also driven to meet us. Together we carpooled.

Uncle Glenn made the comment after church that one of his uncles used to say, “Kids can only sit no more than an hour in church, it doesn’t matter their age.” I’m afraid my sore hips and worn down attention span tend to agree. I am sometimes left to wonder if it isn’t just some deep inner unknown flaw that causes me to feel so down in church, through not completely. Sometimes the sermon speaks, sometimes it’s a hymn line, sometimes it’s found in the introit or readings.

Here is perhaps a skewed and rightly unpopular opinion: The LCMS is not the denomination for people who thrive on fellowship and meaningful relationships. It’s nothing against the pastors. They do what they are trained to do, and they are trained to staunchly believe in what they are doing. Though I am open to considering, to conceding even, that it is not the Sunday script that so much causes me agony, but rather the lack occurring in the every other days.

Which is all the more reason to be glad for family moving closer. They have been going non-stop since the move and soon there is the start of school. I do feel bad for the way the world drives us. A more sense steeled person might look at the situation and say, “Well, this is the life they chose”, as a sort of buffer against pity. But I am not that person, and instead I tend to simply wonder how it’s possible. Too many hardships come upon us unbidden with no choice to be had.

Except perhaps the choice to continue in faith, to not grow weary in doing good, and even that is the Spirit’s gift to us. I don’t know why it’s taken me so long to accept this, to relinquish the need for some kind of reward. Were any Christians of old awarded medals for their deeds or great leaps toward joy? If there had been any trophies, the hymnwriter had it right. To spread your trophies at his feet would be the only sane step, followed only by moving them out of your way.

To then reach for and kiss his feet but I suppose a man would not soon sing that. One day it will be, though he will not leave us there. Until then we struggle rather feebly I’m afraid, until the believer is reunited with Christ upon death. By then it won’t matter one’s particular odd moods or pleasantness, or predictable traits of personality, or however much more he worked to feed the faith of others. As the angel of the Lord said to Elijah in today’s reading, “The journey is too much for you…”

Whoever the person. Whatever the call. But not for God who keeps us going. I find myself wondering if I am to be finding less pleasure or more as the clock ticks on in this world. The things of earth, again just as they said, might grow strangely dim but at the same time my appreciation for things God gives here grows deeper. So still we rejoice and are glad in Him, however weakened, if only for a moment, until the day comes when we shall no longer wonder but see Him fully.

“It was only gradually that I came to understand that some things are meant to be cherished and not sacrificed.”
~Elisabeth Elliot, These Strange Ashes~

It’s been a busy past few days, the calendar sprinkled with family reunions, trips to St. Louis, anniversary outings, and cousin sleepovers. We had a funeral this morning for one of the founding members of our church. He and his wife were married for somewhere around 70 years. Whenever you see her on Sundays she will ask how you are, and after you say you’re doing well and ask her back, she says, “I’m blessed.”

Our anniversary time went well. We returned to the Inn and this time stayed in the Hyacinth room. We had to go the night before the actual date since all the rooms were booked on Friday night because of the fair. We’ve got a pretty good routine down now when it comes to these dates. I used to feel pressure to make sure things happened according to my particular ideas and assumptions of his expectations. The marriage books often said you needed to give yourself time to unwind while away from the kids.

We’re not in that stage now. We know what we like and don’t need to much veer from it. Last night we had a circuit cookout for pastors and families. We don’t really put it on ourselves, camp just serves as a place to have it. We had a family reunion for most of today. Dad and the kids went ahead after the funeral but I stayed behind and went to bed from 1 to 4. It’s the way it must be done when days are fuller. I met them there.

(Photo: Center Park at Lake Springfield)

Sometimes I wish
We could process together
Compare notes
And ask each other
Was it like this for you?

Why would God do this?
Create a call that couldn’t happen
But at the same time
So deeply effect
Our inner lives?

Was there no other way
To keep us close to his path
Would I have really
Not listened
And done something much worse?

And what of the others?
Who through no fault
of their own
No deed deserving
Became lesser

I will love them more now
And you yours
I can accept the gift as is
The force, the intersect, the grounding
Even stronger than you