Homeless

I feel like I've been locked out of my own house, being unable to access my own domain like that. And it's like I'm waiting it out to figure out if it's just a problem with my lock and key or if the locks got changed by the landlady because she doesn't want me in there ever again. Y'know?

Anyway. That is minor. It sucks, but it's good because it leaves me time to be busy doing other things besides blogging.

What I need to write just a little about is my family. Now they're in much more of a homeless state than I. They're not house-less, don't get me wrong: they have a place to live that they're working on getting to be comfortable, family and church are a great support system. Han and Shuan are in a school now, I hear. Ern and Ray will start real soon. But it's all new, somewhat uncomfortable and scary.

And to me, the scariest part is the thought of leaving a life so comfortable and so familiar behind and never being able to return. Not to the way things were. Yeah. Look at me talking about it when it isn't my challenge and I'm completely uninvolved in the process.

But it really is weird for me, even at an arms length - and then some. I have my own apartment here and haven't lived at home for a long while. I don't usually feel that much of a pull to the home I grew up in. But year after year of being away, there was always a comfort in knowing that I could go back for Christmas and things wouldn't be that different. My brothers would be taller, their voices deeper. There would be maybe one more computer added to the living room, a new thing accumulated here and there, a pet or two missing, a few more added etc. But home would be pretty much as I remembered.

Now when I think of home, I think of boxes being packed up and memories being left behind. My brave brothers learning to live together in a small, small apartment just a little bigger than the one I get to myself here in Beijing. There are new friends to be made. The ward in Singapore has taken my family under their wing. I have no idea who they are but I have to love them.

I see my family and I think of Lehi's family leaving Jerusalem behind. Lot and his family leaving Sodom. I'm not the one doing the physical leaving, although emotionally, I think there is some adjusting to be done, but this has been an eye-opener to how difficult it can be to leave your life behind and move on to something that should be better but is 10000 times more uncomfortable and sure doesn't feel like a promised land.

What a trial of your faith. And how difficult it is when you don't have the conviction that you are doing the right thing. I see how easy it is to become a Laman or a Lemuel. Or how strong the pull is to turn around and look back when you've been told not to.

Anyway. Enough blogging about challenges that aren't even directly mine. My family needs your thoughts and prayers.

And I need a blog and some sleep.

Goodnight.