Meh-he-co Part uno

Did I take a Dunkin' pumpkin coffee into Starbucks to sit and write you all?

Why yes.

Yes I did.

The Forties has brought new levels of bravery friends.

I may even keep the white shoes all the way through the Winter.

It's a slippery slope.

Happy Friday to ya.

I really am sorry that it has taken me so very long to get back to you but LIFE is running me ragged these days.

They tell you when your kids are young that the days are long but the years or short but what they don't tell you is that when your kids become adults the days feel like a thousand years.

Each.

Each bright, sunny, blessed, unicorn-like day.

They also don't tell you that when you should be crawling into your nice, cold bed with your dear husband, letting the thousand-year day go and watching America's funniest videos- laughing at people falling down the stairs, you instead talk about all the things that no one can hear.

You might even possibly worry a bit and even laugh at said adult children who legit crack you up.

So when the idea came up for a Mexico missions trip with most of our family I was less worried about the drug cartel and more worried about having that much time with the adult kids.

Okay so that's not really true but I SHOULD have been more worried.......

Let me go back and say that these adults are fabulous.

There are four of them now. Soon to be five.

Help us.

I mean, Hooray!

They are cool and put most of their things away when I ask them four times.

They have all kinds of jobs and financial needs and are learning how to lean hard on the Lord.

They are good citizens and have really held their own.

I just wasn't ready for what walking with them through life would look like.

That just may be because I didn't walk through a lot of adulthood with my parents, leaving just outta hight school and got married straight out of college.

This also may be because I have never parented adults before.

And so marriage, mothering and ministry has turned into a big ball of mess the last few months for me.

And I haven't had the gumption to untangle it friends.

Something just had to "give," and that would be the marriage wheel of the cart.

Now don't look at me like that- you've been there too, you just don't blog about it.

You are obviously smarter than I am.

So with marriage on the fritz my dear husband pulls out our passports the afternoon before we are to leave and cooly tells me that our passports are expired.

Yep.

I thought for a minute or two that he might actually expire as well from the shock of it all.

Because It's too long of a story, I'll summarize by saying that the whole crew minus us and our youngest headed for Mexico City and we high-tailed it to Detroit (also as scary as Mexico City apparently...) and sought to renew our passports.

My new passport photo cost too much for me to even mention here and when you see it you can tell that I was mad about paying that much for the photo....

about the price of gas, our choices for president and about ten million other things.

If "a picture is worth a thousand words," all of those words were, "I'm so mad I could spit."

The drive to Detroit was quiet and for some reason I thought that if I bought three new mascaras while waiting for the passport photo to print AND brought them with me it would magically make the day better?

I mean how much mascara can you wear at one time anyway?

Not much makes sense when in a crazed state.

We had to raise our right hands, give about three weeks of our grocery money and promise our dog to some lady behind three feet of glass and then all there was to do was wait with all the other women in hijabs.

With the face I was making I wished you could only see my eyes right along with them.

We now had time to kill (also not really a funny thing to say when you're in Detroit..) so we walked to lunch.

I stumbled into an Indian restaurant while my husband opted for a sub and ate it in the Indian restaurant with me.

They offered me chai tea that came out piping hot and freshly made with all of it's spices and I did what any reasonable woman trying to just get to Mexico would do.

I just broke down over the goodness of hot tea.

GOOD, hot tea.

the ugly cry and all.

My dear husband just smiled for the knowing and the Indian gal ran to hide behind some kind of curry.

Three days later we were in Mexico, proud of the group and how they had hit the ground running while we tried our best to get to them.

We visited and canvassed and had family pow-wows in our room at night while we looked out at breath-taking thunderstorms that washed the city's smog away.

We talked about pursuing marriage- what that looks like for our girls and for our fellas- how both are just a huge walk of faith, where my husband and I have grown, where we have failed, about financial decisions, about possible moves and ministries, we talked about it all that week in that very bedroom.

Sometimes it felt like an emotional storm rolling in and sometimes it felt like rain washing all of the confusion away.

All good and hard and needful.

All while pushing our own marriage messy down to tend to all the things.

Some times are just like that.

It was so surreal to stand at the very corner of the street where my Grandfather lived and where half of my side of the family began.

Where my Grandfather left to give his son a better life.

That son who had a daughter also had a son who would preach the gospel just miles away from his hometown the very next day.

Something my Grandfather didn't fully understand until just before he died.

How do you accurately describe that feeling?

It gave me such a thrill to know that because of that move I grew up in the place I did, heard the gospel and met my sweetheart.

Standing there with my husband was pretty special to me.

It reminded me that everything boils down to us again.

Off we went to the very heart of the city where there were more people than I think I've ever seen in one place.

When I saw Dunkin' you better believe that before you could say "sombrero" I ordered the BIGGEST iced pumpkin swirl Mexico City has ever seen in a split second.

Each sip seemed to bring cherubs winging God's goodness to me.

And then just as I threw the cup in the garbage I realized that this little sight-seeing jaunt would really be better if I could personally visit EACH AND EVERY sketchy public bathroom I could POSSIBLY FIND.

My stomach was sending serious "E-MER-GEN-CY" vibes to my brain and I was now mad that I ever chugged the coffee.

How the tables had turned.

It was dead to me now.

And I was trying with all my might to NONCHALANTLY let my husband know that Montezuma just called and wanted his iced coffee back.

(to be continued...)