The Harvest

Here would be where you can know as little or as much about why, what and how we got to Road Life. I love to watch the human reaction when they learn about our current season of life. It rather weirds me out when I feel myself talking WAY too much about us and our lives when we meet new people. The slew of questions and intrigue begin rather immediately. I am not a massive fan of being the center of attention. I am a Redhead. So let the inevitable blushing, red-faced and sweating begin. Good land. So strange. 

I do love it though. Not to talk about myself. No. Not that. More so, I get to begin so very quickly explaining what God started. What He did. What He is doing. And how He has used every bit of our life, our stuff and our challenges to change us. And, from what I can tell, change others too. So let me see if I can help guide some of you along on our journey.

The Harvest.

Our life. We built it. It was perfect. Just as we had dreamed and talked about over wine, dinners and times we felt like we would never get where we were headed. This was it. The kids. The job. The house. The wide open space, complete with fishing pond and pool settled into a quiet 5 acres in a small town 15 minutes from downtown Des Moines. I think about it now and still think 'Wo. We did get there. What a picture perfect life!"  

Going back to September/October 2016. I only remember it was harvest because Jason was in the combine at his parents home when the poor guy got the call that started it our snowball. A weekend with only the girls was prime time for me to get some organizing done since we had now lived in our house for just a year. I still see myself sitting on the arm of our downstairs couch looking at all the "stuff" I had buried myself in and staring out the window to our perfect fountain in the middle of the pond. And I couldn't breathe. I could not stop the tears and somehow couldn't find the air to fill my lungs. So I did what every irrational wife does: Called my husband who was 4 hours away and could do absolutely nothing for me in that moment. Poor men. I wish they could feel how it really does seem like the only option we girls have when we are losing it. Call the man. He will know what to do! 

He had to have been thinking someone was bleeding profusely, the house was burning down or someone had died. I could barely get words out. But was able to only whisper, "I can't breathe with all this stuff. I can't do this anymore. Something has to change." My very calm Jason just so sweetly talked me down with, "Ok. Well, when I get home in a couple days we can take some stuff to Good Will." 

And so God's harvest began. All the' things' He had planted in our lives, was about to be gathered to be sold, donated or given away. At first, we only saw our basement storage room being cleaned out. And then our closets started. Followed by garage items, Baby items, bedspreads and sheets from both our of college and single days, clothes we hadn't worn in nearly 10 years and moved 4 times to 3 different states, boxes of, no joke, wedding gifts we were keeping for "someday"... And on and on. Just let your brain filter through every room and closet in your home. 

We were beginning to get the nauseating feeling that there was something a bit more coming.