mentalpause

Re-entry is almost always a little tricky, and this is no exception. It's not like I didn't have enough time because I had plenty. It's not like I wanted to stay or even that I'd turn around and go right back if I could. The only thing that comes close to nailing it is how you seem to grow another heart the day you have a baby. It's like that heart belongs entirely to that child, and he can be anywhere in the world--Madrid, Texas, or downstairs in his room--but inside that heart that resides in your core, an essential part of you is somehow righthere with him. I had a connection intellectually with Israel before, but now it's grown arms and legs and skin and hair and blood. I've had a small taste of His longing over, protection of, and passionate history with the people of this place, and something inside me has changed.

I never wanted to be one of those people who constantly makes references to the exotic place she's just visited. That gets old f-a-s-t. Chances are however, that I'm probably more like the things I'd rather not be, so I hope you'll give me grace and maybe a gentle nudge if I lapse into that behavior. You'll know that even though I'm right there in your living room or commenting away online, there's a wadge of me away across the sea...

Deuteronomy 7:6-9