Settling In

My summer vacation was good for me.  It was good to see family, it was good to see pine trees, it was good to drive a car - but more than that, it was good to be able to look forward to coming back to Sri Lanka.  That is something I honestly didn't think I would be able to do.  When we landed in the States in June, I immediately began wondering how in the world I was going to be able to leave all that for Colombo in just 8 short weeks.  But like all seasons in life, as the summer progressed and all the traveling ensued I slowly began to long for the steady routine of school days, the ability to cook my own food in my kitchen and how good it feels to sleep in my own bed.  When did Sri Lanka become home? How did I end up sitting on a back porch in North Carolina contemplating which flowers would grow best in my cement planters in Sri Lanka? It took me by surprise, but I slowly began to make my plans for return.  And in making those plans, I realized that in the year we have been overseas, we never truly moved into our home.  Sure, we did some initial setting up, but we still have pictures that haven't been hung, we still have spaces that we just kind of ignore.  I have let all the plants in those cement planters die.  I think it was too much to expect our first year to make a home, homeschool my daughter, learn a completely foreign culture, work out transportation and on and on and on...  But this is year two, and I need to have a home.  It's in me to settle, whether that is for a month or ten years.  These all go toward lessons that I will carry with me to our next post. I can't look back and think I messed up, I will just move forward and make this place a home for the months to come.