Dallas

Something extraordinary just happened and I didn't see it coming. I have been fighting the urge to think this for about 3.5 months and then, just like that, the thought went through my head with a genuine belief. I like Dallas. I like living in Dallas. Whoa, I didn't see that one coming.

I moved back to Dallas from Washington DC around Thanksgiving for two main reasons: (1) I didn't like living so far away from my family and felt that I was missing out on my siblings growing up and (2) Nathan was looking for a job in Dallas. Those two reasons alone compelled me to leave my job in DC and move back. Moving to DC was a fulfillment of a dream that I had for 4 years. All I wanted was to move to DC, work for the military or intelligence services and have my life be ruled by a Blackberry, tight deadlines, late work nights, midnight calls to come back to work and a relentless life pace that can only be upheld by someone in their twenties. It was all I wanted, it was my dream.

I actually went back to DC this weekend to visit friends and tour the White House. It was pretty incredible to be that close to the building that has housed so many Presidents and their families, where the decision to start wars has been made, where Prime Ministers and President's have met and where the men and women that have defined the history of the country have walked.



What I expected to feel this weekend was an intense longing to go back to DC. I expected to walk away regretting the decision that I had made to move back to Dallas and away from a dream I had wanted to live for so many years. But, those feelings never came. Instead, I came back to Dallas and realized how much I love this city. I am starting a new and fantastic (albeit scary) life here in this city, specifically, in 58 days. Sometimes I let all the scariness of this new stage of life terrify me. Sometimes I lay in bed at night so afraid that I am giving up my freedom to do whatever I want whenever I want, my dream to bike across Europe with only a backpack holding my belongings, my hope of one day working at a church and loving in high school girls, and my (almost) secret desire to have a job where I get to carry a gun (weird, I know).

But then I come back to the fact that I would rather live my life with this man than do anything else. I know that there will be hard days. I know that some days I will have to make a conscious decision to love, and it won't be easy. I know the storms will continue to come and that life will get harder. But I would rather do this thing called life with him, whatever city we are in, whatever job I hold, than be anywhere else.

This doesn't mean I have failed and bailed at the dream I held through all of college. I went and I lived it for 6 great months. And honestly, I probably would regret never moving out there and at least trying it. But I have a new dream now. It's not a dream for my life and my career, it's a dream for our life. And I wouldn't trade that for the world.

in the blink of an eye.....

i got a message at 9:40 this morning asking for prayer for a girl from high school who had been in a car wreck in tyler. i stopped what i was doing, begged the Lord to heal her body, to give the doctors wisdom in treating her, and to give her the strength to fight and then i went on with my day, confident that the Lord would do exactly as I asked. then at 4:24 i got another message simply stating that she was with the Lord. just like that. one moment i was fretting about what to eat for dinner and then the very next second, mourning the loss of a friend. in the blink of an eye, she was gone. just like that.

"he has made everything appropriate in its time. he has also set eternity in their heart, yet so that man will not find out the work which God has done from the beginning even to the end." eccl. 3:11

he has set eternity in their hearts.

thats something i don't understand. and it's something that i don't think i ever will. honestly, it scares me, so i don't think about it. i like control. i think to know what is coming next and, if possible, to make sure that i am prepared for it. but the life that comes after this is something that is not in my control and i cannot manipulate it at all.

i was talking to an older lady last week who was commenting on another older friend that had gone in to the hospital for the last time. she said something that has stuck with me ever since then. she said, the veil between here and there is so small, so quick, so little. and it is. we are here this second and gone the next.

it makes me put things in perspective. the things i was worrying about this morning don't even matter right now. nothing really matters to me right now, except for spending time with the people i love and making sure i live a life that is worthy of the calling of my Lord and Saviour.

so tonight we didn't do any wedding plans. we didn't work out. we didn't worry about what apartment we will live in or whether i will drop my middle name (elizabeth) and make it zandstra or just drop the zandstra all together (a point on contention in the last few days). no, tonight we picked up hamburgers and french fries and rented the latest harry potter movie, since nathan finally finished the 5th book. we sat on the couch and simply enjoyed just being near each other and drank decaf coffee. tonight, we simply loved the life that Christ has given us.

so please, love this life, because today, tomorrow and yesterday were a gift. and i sure don't want to get to the end of this life and look back over a series of appointments and meetings. i want to have laughed long and hard and made sure that God knew that he gave this precious gift of life to someone who appreciated it and lived it to the fullest extent possible.