But you were washed … (March 28)

When I titled my last post I was thinking of Glen Campbell’s song “Galveston, O Galveston … so I looked up the lyrics tonight now that I’m back online. We now understand what hemeant about the “sea winds blowing” “sea waves crashing” and “seabirds flying”. But the rest of the song which seems to be about leaving a love behind to go off to war doesn’t apply very well – I went there with my partner and love of my life and she is still with me and we are on a mission of peace- not war. Still we like the song and it ran through our minds as we walked and listened to the wind, waves and calling of the birds.

To-day we drove to San Antonio. We came the scenic route – going south from Galveston into Surfside beach and then “tacked” our way cross-country to US87 at Victoria. I say tacked because San Antonio is south west of Galveston but the roads run mostly North-south or East-west so we had to “zig-zag” not unlike a sailboat tacking tomake progress against the wind. We hadn’t been driving too long when we hit torrential rains. This was the first heavy rain we had encountered since we left home and I was grateful for 2 reasons – 1) we were inside and traveling – not trapped by the rain when we wanted to be outside (or having to be outside and getting drenched) and 2) the BBB was covered with salt and grit both from the roads on our way down from the north and from sitting near the ocean for 3 weeks -- When we got to San Antonio she was glistening clean – better washed that I could have done with hours of work. This led me to think of how God does things we can’t do and the passage in I Cor.6:11 came to mind.

It was good to see farm country and hills again after miles and miles of flat coast land. – lots of cattle grazing and large fields of corn just starting to grow. (before we got away from the flat country)

When we got here one of the first things I did was fire up my laptop to get an “INTERNET” fix. – 4 days cold turkey – I was having serious withdrawal problems. It was good to check John Dobbs ’”Hope Remains” blog.

Linda & I have been talking about the value of our experience in Pascagoula and remembering our friends there—Hello John(times 3) , David (times 10?), (David J.- Jack Jr.says hello -- he is the navigator sitting up front and keeping an eye on things) Elaine Steve, Pam, Robbie, James, Jeff (times 2), Vivian, Margaret, Ann, Harry, Ricky, Debbie, Stella, Aloha, Gary, Re-re, Winona, -- and so many more – I probably missed someone obvious What we pray most of all is that we can recreate at least some of the attitude of service and meeting needs when we return home. Maybe we haven’t had a Katrina to devastate our community but in so many lives there is devastation none the less. How can we be the neighbors and friends that help rather than just being comfortable in our own world?

In the meantime, we did laundry and talked to all our kids this evening so all is well with our universe.Melissa's friend Alexander has arrived in Kingston from Sweden so she is bubbling. She had her first physio session for her knee and they have taped it until she can strenghten the muscles with exercise they have given her. When we talked to Kevin, Will was talking in the background wanting his Dad to get off the phone and return to play with him. -We will spend tomorrow with Chris, Tammye, Hunter & Camdyn – they have suggested the Enchanted Springs Ranch so for tomorrow atleastperhaps we’ll becowboys (and cowgirls).

Goodnight & God Bless
Charlie & Linda