Journey's End

And what a journey it's been.

We moved in November, spending the month in Portland, doing our best to stay dry.  We drank good coffee, dodged parked cars on narrow streets, and enjoyed living with family across the street from the Kennedy School.

We drove to Memphis in December.  We met some of Danny's extended family in the Little Rock Area, visited museums and restaurants in Little Rock, Memphis, and Nashville.  We got to meet Ree and Ladd Drummond at the now-closed Davis-Kidd Bookstore. We watched the Peabody Ducks swim in the hotel fountain and waddle down a red carpet to the elevator.

Also heard my first tornado siren.

Hoping it's the last.

We returned to the Pacific Northwest in early March and moved into a corporate apartment which, after living in a dark, smelly hotel room for three months, was particularly magical.  Throw in some sunshine, the ability to sit on a couch and have both an extra bedroom *and* bathroom, and we were in good shape.

We got a puppy, who turned out to be a teenage girl in disguise.  We also looked for a house, fell in love with one and watched as the deal fell through.  We began to build a second, which took...

...a while.

But it ended.

And we completed the sale.

And the bank did not laugh at us or throw rocks.

And we moved in.  Actually, not in that order.  We didn't actually fund before we moved in, which made me nervous that the bank would, at the last  minute, decide to laugh or throw rocks (not that they have reason to do so, but I'd had a *bit* of anxiety about the subject).

So now we have a house, our first house, and a garage and a KITCHEN and a yard and an actual dining room...

...Did I mention the kitchen?

It's good to be home.  I'm realistic enough to know that we'll probably move again, very possibly out of state again, but for right now it's nice to let some roots go deep.  And now that we're settled, life starts again. Work starts again.  There will be guest posts on this blog and more posts about writing, since I'll be back to full-time work.  Thanks for being patient through this unexpected hiatus, and don't worry - there will be more books!

Travels: Part III - They Bag the Milk

They really do.  If you go to the grocery store and buy a gallon of milk, when you check out, they put it in a bag.  It's one of many things that are different 'round these parts.

Also, there aren't a lot of hills or mountains.  I mean, sometimes the road goes up and down a bit, but it's not like you every look out the window and say "hey, look at those hills." I grew up in Eugene, which is partly framed by the Coburg Hills, which turn purple and misty sometimes in the early morning hours.  I got really excited when we were driving to Little Rocks a few weeks ago, because for the first time in a long time, I looked out the window and saw a hill, a really ill.  It rose out of the ground, beautiful and green.  I turned to Danny (who was driving) to point it out.  We admired it for a moment...then sniffed.

"Yeah..." Danny said.  "That's an old landfill that's been covered over."

Oh.

It was pretty, though.  For a landfill.

My favorite BBQ place around here, so far, is Corky's on Poplar.  We stepped inside and were immediately gestured forward as if we were not only expected, but late.  We were seated immediately.  Later we realized how lucky we'd been - the entryway was full of people waiting for a table.  The food was delicious, the fries were the best I've had in Memphis, the staff was friendly and attentive, and everyone wandered around humming along with the strains for Elvis and his contemporaries that played over the sound system.

Also, the food was plated very well.  You come to appreciate this after a while.  And the apple BBQ sauce? Amazing.

The BBQ was good.  We tried going out for Mexican, which turned out to be a mistake.  There just aren't enough Mexicans in the area for good Mexican food.  There were peas in the Spanish rice.  Oh, and they managed to put bacon on the menu.  Authentic Mexican, it wasn't.  Ironically, the place was packed; online, it's reviewed as the best Mexican place in town.

It's been very cold lately, but we're looking forward for a touch of warmth.  We walked through the Memphis Zoo before Christmas.  Next up? Walking through Rhodes college.  It's really beautiful, architecturally.  Also, my grandmother had lunch at the Peabody Hotel in 1947 and watched the ducks walk around the lobby.  The ducks "march" in at 11am daily - I'm thinking duck-watching and lunch, one of these days.

We're still looking for a church.  We've tried a couple, but finding a West-Coast style of worship and teaching in the middle of the Bible Belt is a little tricky.  The funny thing is that Danny's co-workers ask, often, if we've found a church yet.

I know a lot of my readers don't hail from the Pacific Northwest, so let me fill you in - this would never, ever happen back home.  The area is so un-churched and largely anti-Christian that you never approach the subject with a stranger without making observations first (stray Bible verse, book from a Christian publisher, a promise to pray about something, t-shirt/bumper-sticker with religious overtones, etc.), then moving on to oblique questions on the subject.

The funny thing is, once two believers realize they're both believers, a certain amount of spiritual chest-beating can ensue.  Years of Sunday School taught, Bible-Study leadership, Christian College attendance...all of this is to prove that you're not an entry-level believer.

Worry not, evangelism is alive and well in the Northwest.  There are lots of people to spread the gospel to.  The method's just different, that's all.

What really cracks me up out here is that there is, I kid you not, a Baptist Rehabilitation Center.

I love it.  I love it much.

On a completely different subject, the Golden Globes are Sunday!  Barring a terrible time-zone related mix-up (which, surprisingly, happened last year), I'll be micro-blogging through the live broadcast here.  Can't wait! In the meantime, here are some red-carpet tips in case you feel like getting into the spirit of Award Season.  I might keep some in mind for this year's ACFW Banquet!

Bright Side

It's been a doozy of a year.  Difficult, in many, many ways.  I kicked it off at the start with the release of one book (Plain Jayne) while being waaaaay behind schedule on another (Simply Sara, the little snot). I got my first taste of book signings, radio interviews, and publicity campaigns. Danny had a promising job offer, which was very exciting until it fell through.

We continued by getting Danny done with graduate school, me turning in Sara (she redeemed herself), and flying out to the East Coast so Danny could properly matriculate, which he turned out to be very good at.  I was supposed to be working on galley edits while we were out, which I turned out not to be very good at.

During the summer, Danny and I celebrated our third wedding anniversary.  I taught at Oregon Christian Writers; Danny recovered from graduate school.  By the end of that week, both my grandfather and Danny's grandfather went home to Jesus.  We traveled to one memorial and wished that we could have been at the other as well.  Simply Sara released, looking a little out of breath. Short weeks later, not only had the previous job offer been placed back on table, but it was backed up by an interview in Memphis while I attended my first ACFW conference.

As the weeks progressed, we prepared ourselves for a move to the Mid-South when the company came back and offered Danny a job in their Richland, Washington office, a move that stunned us both but felt like a grand idea.  We tidied, we donated, we packed, we moved, we relied on the kindness of others and later drove across the country so Danny could do his engineer training in Memphis.

It's been a tricky year.  We've had a lot of loss, change, difficulties, both personal and professional.  It's been hard some times to choose joy, to choose to examine the beautiful parts while giving mourning its due.

During our trip to the East Coast we got to see some of the best-looking ceilings in the country

The Library of Congress

 

The National Cathedral

 ...and some of it's prettiest architecture.  We've gotten to visit children we love...

...and enjoy the simple beauty of God's creation near our home.

We've had adventures, and we will have more.  We visited 19 states, made new friends, visited old ones.  It's been a big year for us, and I don't have any reason to think next year won't be just as crazy.

So I'm embracing the crazy.  As long as the Father knows what He's doing (and He assures me He does), I eagerly anticipate what the next year has in store for us.

I saw Amish people

See that? In the window? See that Amish head? Total accident. I actually took four shots of this parked buggy, and in the last one I got a little happy surprise. I didn't want to actually try to take a picture of an Amish person because one of the premises of my book is treating Amish people like normal people and not circus freaks, and while the urge to snap is very strong when faced with the strangely bearded, I resisted and, in my opinion, was given a little present for my moral fortitude.

Ha ha. Anyway.

After we purchased our plane tickets for my grandmother's memorial service, I posted something about our trip East on Facebook. My editor then asked if we were headed to Amish country...and it got me to thinking.

Were there Amish in North Carolina?

I knew Grandma wouldn't mind. She would have rolled her eyes and drawled, "Honey, if you need to go see the Amish, go see the Amish." And that would have been that.

Technically, there is only supposed to be one settlement, in Union Grove, but the settlement we visited was in the much-closer town of Hamptonville. Goes to show that the Amish settlment censuses (censi?) aren't wildly accurate. We also saw...


A buggy sign...




...and a traveling buggy with real people in it...

...and Amish kittens.

The last two shots are brough to you by my cousin Melissa, seeing as how I shot a slew of photos without my memory card inside my camera. I have grieved the loss and moved on, although the shot I'm saddest about loosing is the black kitten walking through an Amish-carved spindle-thingy.

Grieved. Moved on.

Anyway, we stopped at the Shiloh General Store, where we ate Amish ice cream (good stuff), bought fudge and Strawberry-Rhubarb butter. The store was run by an Amishman; a young lady served us the ice cream. We chatted with the older gentleman for a little while - once he found out we were from Oregon, he asked if we'd ever been to Sisters. Aparently there's a farming periodical that's published out of Sisters, and it was the only connection he had with Oregon.

He also told us about his son-in-law who ran a woodshop down the street, so we hiked down a bit - that's where we found the kittens.

All in all, a great trip. I didn't work up the nerve to ask anyone any questions, although in hindsight there were several things I could have asked and sounded intelligent about. I mean, it's not like I haven't researched these people for the last several months.

For a change of pace, we went to the fair that evening. We watched pig races (winning piglet gets an oreo), and I got to pet a camel :

Also fed it a carrot round and nearly lost a finger (more user error than camel violence).

We had a wonderful trip. I got to see my grandpa, as well as aunts, uncles, and cousins I don't get to see very often. And we really want to go back, although the next trip will likely involve fewer Amish and more of the BMW factory tour...