Trying to be convinced to move to Maryland - Day 3 - The good kind of selfish

Trying to be convinced to move to Maryland - Day 3 - The good kind of selfish.

I didn't get a chance to blog yesterday, so I'll finish up my comments on the Maryland trip today.
MOst of Sunday was about getting home. Due to the time change, we had an extra hour to sleep. That was nice. It would have been nicer had the Indian type drum music not have come through the wall of my hotel room 30 minutes prior to when I had planned on waking up. I don't know for certain that it was India music. It reminded me a lot of the music that filtered through the wall of my college theater when Balethnic (ethnic ballet troupe, which always seemed to be doing something vaguely Indian) was in the "big theater" with which we shared a wall. So, I got up, got showered, enjoyed breakfast (the oatmeal seemed less salty but still wasn't as good as what we had on the mission trip in Reynosa, Mexico) and then headed back to the room to pack my gear. Thanks to all of the random stuff that I was given over the weekend as well as the box of banana Twinkies I picked up at the Food Lion, my duffle was significantly heavier than on the trip out. But it wasn't anything I couldn't handle.

We had to be down in the lobby to board the bus by 10am. On my way down, I stopped in the hotel's business center to print my boarding pass. Apparently there was a way to do that from any computer connected to the hotel's wireless internet, but I didn't feel like fussing with it. Greg, who is the alpha computer guy in my group and the guy I hung out with most of the weekend (his wife stayed home with the kids, mostly due to having a six month old son that she wasn't excited about leaving) tried it but wasn't successful. So, I didn't feel bad about not even giving it a shot.

The ride up to Baltimore was uneventful. I enjoyed watching the beautiful trees (just on the far side of peak color, so leaves were starting to drop off, providing the ground with a beautiful, technicolor carpet) roll by with my iPod providing a soundtrack of RUF songs. That also gave me a chance to think about the weekend and reflect on the possibility of moving to Southern Maryland. As I expected prior to the trip, I haven't changed my mind about not wanting to move to Maryland. Nothing against the place. I know now that I could live there. But, I really don't want to. Partly I wasn't that thrilled with the area. I'm used to living in at least a suburb of a large city, if not right in the middle of one. The two times that I've lived in a smaller area (Savannah, when I was a co-op in college and Lancaster, California when I was working at Edwards) didn't go well. I didn't like either area. I had trouble making friends outside of those I knew outside of the area. And I just really wasn't happy there. The other thing I thought about was the idea of having to start the outside of work portion of my life over again. And that's a big thing that I really don't want to do. I like my life. I love my friends who I consider family. I'm not ready to leave that. I do know that if God wants me to live in Southern Maryland, He'll let me know and he'll take care of me. He's been faithful in the past and I know He will continue to be faithful in the future. But, it's gonna take a lot for me to be convinced that moving away from the life I have here in Fort Worth is the right thing to do. and it's going to take even more if the destination of my move is anywhere other than the Atlanta area (that would only be like starting half over. Kinda like coming back to school after the summer.)

And, on the drive up to Baltimore, I did see three dead deer on my side of the bus, and that was when I wasn't dozing. I think that brought the weekend's roadkill count to five dear, at least two dogs and two or three smaller animals of indefinable species. Southern Maryland is a bit more rural than the DFW metroplex.

Upon arriving at BWI, Greg and I headed straight for security, stood in line for about 10 minutes and then realized that we had a couple of hours to kill before the flight. It was lunchtime, and just down from our gate was a Potbellys Sandwich works. I wondered how well an "order what you want" type sandwich place would work in a location with that high of volume. Apparently, it works very well. My sandwich was made to my specifications and with minimal wait despite there being a long line. The oatmeal chocolate chip cookie was good too. Lunch included a conversation about what are some of my favorite television shows. (Top five are 1.Buffy the Vampire Slayer 2.MASH tie for 3.West Wing (seasons 1-4 and maybe bits of five) and Battlestar Galatica (the new one) and 4. Veronica Mars. If we were to expand to top 10, Firefly and Sports Night (focusing primarily on the first season and neglecting the middle of the second) would definitely have made the cut. Interstingly, of the shows that I consider my all time favorites, only one is currently airing and multiple were cancelled after just a seasons or three.). After lunch, I settled in at the gate and picked up where I had leftoff at prepping my lesson for small group with my high school girls. That and reading and making comments on Psalm 32 for my small group kept me busy through about the first 30 minutes of the flight again, with my iPod providing background music (although I switched to instrumental hymns). After finishing up small group homework, I pulled out the laptop and enjoyed the first two episodes of Angel season 2 and some of the special features from Veronica Mars season 3 DVDs (including the season 4 presentation reel. That would have made for excellent television).

We landed a bit early and had to wait for the previous aircraft to clear the gate. And I got to thinking about the weekend again and chatted briefly with a coworker's wife who was sitting next to me. And, I realized that not only did I not want to move to Maryland, but that I really did miss my family here in Fort Worth over the weekend. I know that part of it was missing worship that morning (and not having the opportunity to worship with any congregation that day, due to the transportation schedule). And part of it was spending the weekend thinking about and investigating the possibility of moving away from that family. And, at some point in there I decided that if I at all could, I would make it to my small group as well as to small group with my high school girls.

After deplaning and a quick stop in the little I-don't-want-to-move-to-Maryland people's room, I caught the shuttle bus back to my car (at The Parking Spot....the company with the yellow buses with the black spots. They may look a little silly to some (not me), but you can see them coming as you're waiting to be picked up. And that's what matters.)
I got to my car, go paid and was on my way by about 4:20. I also found out that the Parking Spot now gives oatmeal applesauce cookies as well as a bottle of water when you checkout. They're not great, but they're something and I was kinda hungry. And then I was finally on the last leg of my journey home. My mind was still swimming and I knew I had to do something to focus and get my mind off of the sad thought of leaving Fort Worth and back into the game so that I would have a chance of giving some sort of coherent lesson for small group with the girls. So, I did what I normally do in that sort of situation. I put in the Buffy the Vampire Slayer musical episode CD, cranked the volume and sang at the top of my lungs. Not sure why this helps to stop my brain from swimming off in a million directions at once. Other CDs don't do nearly as good a job. It just works, so I don't question it too much. And about five minutes after 5pm I was home. Whoo-Hoo!!!

My cats were excited to see me, after I let them sniff around a bit and reminded them who I was (They get like that after I've been gone a few days, but not after I've been gone for about a week. It's weird. I think after a while, they're lonely enough that they're happy to have attention from anyone. The fact that it's me is just a bonus.) I tossed my bags down, transfered the stuff I needed into my church backpack, grabbed what would become dinner, changed shoes and within 15 minutes was off again. Schedule-wise, it would have made more sense for me to skip my small group. But I wanted to be with my family. And so I was. It was great walking into church and seeing all the people who I love and who love me. I had a quick chance to chat with a few, make the copies that I needed for girls' small group and then headed up to the room where my small group meets. And it was a great time. I'm still getting comfortable with my small group, but it's coming along nicely. I got to hold Winston, the four month old son of our group leader. He's a cutie and looks so much like his older brother. We talked about Psalm 32 and prayed a bunch. And it was good.
Then I headed down to the high school room for girls' small group. I had no idea how the lesson would go. We were talking about self-identity or "people according to God", about what we were created for, how we should think about that and how that should affect how we live. The thing is, it's a lesson that's heavy on thoughts and light on real concrete, check the box applications. Which is fine, it just also makes it a little more difficult to teach and I didn't have a lot of interaction built into the lesson. But I did have a nifty little illustration with a screw driver that I opened with and came back to and used to tie it all together again (which was good, cause I have trouble ending lessons well). And I think the girls' enjoyed it and found it beneficial. No one fell asleep. There was some participation. I don't think I scared off our visitor. I know there were times when the lessons was a little disjointed and I know I lost my train of thought multiple times. But, I figure for having been home for 15 minutes in the prior about three days, that was pretty good. Afterwards, I hung out with a few of the girls for a while and we chatted and bonded over a love of sci-fi entertainment (mostly television shows, but also a few movies). And we got a lot more done on the puzzle (we'll have it done before Thanksgiving...of this year. :) ). And it was great to get to hang out with my family for the evening.
I might have been a bit selfish in subjecting others to the discombobulatedness that was me last night, but as Scott (my small group leader) said, they were happy to have me there. It was the good kind of selfish.