Memory Card

There is always this moment when we flick on our signal, go around that deep curve, and see this stretching out ahead of us:
Hope, who now understands what this moment means, leads the girls in excited shouts and the pumping of fists... "We're here! We're here!" What a joyful chorus.

But there's another moment when we fold the last bit of laundry Nana so graciously washed, when the final bag makes its way out to the car, when we hug and cry and pray.

The moment when we see that drive from the opposite angle.

Every time it's hard and every time the girls catch on to the bittersweetness all the more. I fight back another round of tears, take a deep breath, and about a half hour into the drive remember something precious.

Our memory card.

I click through each photo, each memory... and my tank is refueled. An apple orchard afternoon, Uncle Billy coaching young men in the Friday night lights, late bedtimes and lazy mornings, big meals, extra hugs and kisses, caramel apples with Aunt Andrea, dinner and laughs with Aunties, and fall fun with lots of extended family in Pop Pop and Nana's leaf strewn yard. There is so much to be thankful for.





It reminds me of Hope just the other day choking back tears as I helped her dress for the preschool that she loves. "Sometimes, Mama," she says scrunching up close to my face, "Sometimes I still miss you." I hold her close because I remember something too. Almost seven years ago when Joe and I showed up at my parents upon returning from our honeymoon. We reminisced about the wedding, shared the vacation pictures, and then it was time for me to officially leave their house on the way to my very own home. I didn't have the words, but we all swallowed hard.

As a grown woman who today leaves that place for another more far away home with my family that I love, for a home where God has called us to be... I still choke back tears whenever my "sometimes" surfaces and bubbles over.


Hopey, girl after my own heart, I get it. For as long as I'm able to do it, may this blog be your very own memory card. One to share with your sisters in all the half hours down the road that you all might need.
~Mama