Homeleave #5: Southern Comfort

Oren and David sitting atop a corn seeder in Kansas City.


As inconsistent as I have been about blogging regularly during homeleave, I am trying to update from time to time to keep friends in Burundi informed about what we are doing, and also to keep a record of the way we spent our time.

We were quite intentional about planning our homeleave.  3 months is more than a vacation and there are times of leisure as well as times of intentional visiting and relational work.  There is some keeping in touch with our program in Burundi, although Felix seems to be handling the added responsibility during this time masterfully.  There is also the shopping, doctor visits, etc. that need to be done here due to the lack of these options in Burundi.

We divided our homeleave into several parts, some more relaxing than others.  The first 4 weeks were spent mainly in Baltimore with our parents (alternating between houses) with a one week visit to Poughkeepsie, NY where Rebecca and I worked before moving to Burundi.  This was a fairly relaxing month, we did do some church visiting, but the days were spent mainly taking kids to play grounds and even going almost daily to a healthclub ourselves to enjoy some exercise.

Beginning on July 6th, we moved into a more relational mode and are dividing this into 3 parts, we spent about 12 days visiting members of my family (brothers, Aunts and Uncles, nieces and nephews).  We begin tomorrow with a week of personal time for Rebecca and I away from our children in Vancouver, Canada, and then we will do a week with Rebecca's family at a vacation spot in upstate NY.

This will leave the last 3 weeks for us to have again less programmed time back in Baltimore before returning to Burundi.

So I want to recount a bit about the visit to relatives on my side of the family.  I might preface this by saying something about the cultural experience this offered.  Most of my relatives live in the midwest or deep South--some natively and others transplants while Rebecca and I are basically a family of 3rd culture New York Yankees.  So going to a part of the country folks down there call the U-nahted States (emphasis on the U) can be intimidating.  (They can tell our 'ethnicity' by our accents and generally don't take kindly to Democrats.) ;-)

We made plans to visit one of my Aunt Binnie and Uncle Bill in Kansas City as the first stop.  (I had lived with them some in College.)  Since KC is a bit off the beaten path we flew there from Baltimore.  Although 2 of my 3 cousins were not there at the time, we had a great time with Bill and Binnie and my cousin Beth.  (Incidentally, my cousin Beth Armstong is author of the excellent book What's Prayer Got To Do With It).

Bill and Binnie live on the edge of the city limits on a 40 acre farm, so our children really enjoyed playing out in the fields, by the pond, and climbing on an antique iron corn seeder.  They also loved all the nooks and crannies in the fabulously redone old farm house where they live.

We mainly relaxed and enjoyed great food, but did go out for a tour of the city on one day.  Kansas City is a railroad town and we were able to see many model and real trains including long coal trains and double-stack container cars that fascinated Oren.  (His chief complaint about Burundi is that there are no trains there.)

We left early on Monday morning to return to Baltimore and on the same day headed south by car this time to North Carolina where we stayed the night at my brother Mark's house before joining most of the rest of my family and spouses and kids at Fontana Dam North Carolina for a 3 day stay at a Smoky Mountain resort.  The trip down went well and we visited with Mark who was still at his house eventhough his wife Christine and my nieces had gone ahead to Fontana with my parents.

We left early the next morning and got to Fontana Dam in the afternoon.  (The roads through the Smoky Mountains reminded me of Burundi roads upcountry in terms of curviness, but these were extremely well paved and even banked.

Fontana has much to recommend it and when we got there Oren and David were happy to be able to play with their cousin's Abigail, Grace, and Fletcher.  (The latter is his age.)  We all rode bikes, swam, and even did karaoke, square danced, played put-put golf, frisbee golf, went on a boat trip, to name a few of the activities.

The time seemed to go by too quickly and we could not do it all in the time we had.  We continued on from Fontana, NC to Nashville Tennessee where my brother Jonathan is an MD at Vanderbilt Hospital.  His wife Emma works there too as a researcher.  We arrived en masse with our family and my parents.

Oren and Fletcher, being age mates had a lot in common which created about as much conflict as it did amusement for them.  All in all it went well and bike riding was one of the favorite activities for them.  (Especially when Fletcher took Oren to see Engine 475 an enormous old steam engine now stationed in a public park.)  They circled the engine on bikes for nearly an hour.

We did enjoy a date night with Jon and Emma while my parents watched the 3 children.  They took us out to see the sights of historic Nashville (home of American Country Music for those who are reading this who are not American.)  We saw the original Grand Old Opry as well as the new enormous Opryland hotel complex.  (Imagine acres of enclosed airconditioned indoor gardens, like Versaille under glass.  It was impressive in its opulence.

We left Nashville on Monday and headed back the 2 day journey to Baltimore.  The kids were more antsy coming back than going out.  We stopped back through My brother Mark and Christine's house in North Carolina on the way home.  It may be the last time we see them until next year.  We left mid-morning to Tuesday and got to Baltimore by evening.  (We did stop through Harrisonburg Virginia and saw Eastern Mennonite University, but missed our ex-SALTer Robyn Mast who was working that day.)  We did not miss any McDonalds playland from Baltimore to Nashville and back though.  It does help to wear the kids out a bit during our lunch breaks.

It was nice to be back in Baltimore at my parents house and we enjoyed working out a bit on Wednesday after all that driving.  We also had a Birthday party for Rebecca at her brother Paul's house who lives up the road from my parents.  Many of our long time family friends were there and everyone shared a fond childhood memory of Rebecca.  It is hard to believe that all of us have known her since she was 2 years old.  (I could add that this was her 39th Birthday but none of you would believe me, but it really was her first 39th Birthday!)

It is late Thursday night and I am trying to get this posted before we head out again tomorrow morning for what I might call the centerpiece or crown jewel of our homeleave.  Rebecca and I are going to go to Vancouver Canada to her old seminary to ostensibly take a 1 week course on the Psalms, but it is also a getaway as a couple, away from the kids.  Our parents have generously offered to watch them for a week.  This is the first time we have ever left them alone for such a long time (in fact they have never been without us both overnight.)  So we are anxious, but excited about the chance this will give us to renew as a couple.  (Those of you with young kids know having time as a couple is rare, and I would say has been a more challenging part of our work than living in Burundi.)

So we will leave at 6am Friday morning.  Please pray for a renewing time for us and that our kids will be  OK with the grandparents.