Hello again

 Before I post this, I want to acknowledge that I have not written in almost 4 years. That's completely crazy to me, but alas, here we are. That having been said, hello again.

As most of us have been, I’ve the last 13 days looking back at the last year and remembering examining wondering what the heck just happened contemplating the weirdness that was 2020. So much of what’s in my head has been said by all the people in all the ways in all the places. I won’t put my own spin on all of “that,” but I have noticed some incredible timing that I want to rehash here.

In November of 2019, Doug and I went to Arkansas to celebrate our 15^th anniversary. I had a mild meltdown/breakthrough/come-to-Jesus with myself out there in the woods. I have done this to myself every year for the last bazillion years and once more, I found myself in a place where I had far too many balls in the air, far too many hats on my head, and far too few moments of peace sprinkled throughout. When we got away from the noise of everyday life, it was so incredibly quiet that I felt overwhelmed by the silence. I can remember sitting on the couch at our little AirBnB drinking my coffee and just looking at the lake and the fall leaves. I remember thinking to myself, “I should be DOING something! But I just don’t want to…” When we came home, I posted a long tirade on Facebook about how tired I was of doing all the things for all the people and I just. Wanted. To. Slow. Down. Many of my friends and family reached out and shared that they felt the same way but none of us knew what the heck to do about it.

Later that week, I was up at Lia’s school serving Thanksgiving lunch (another hat I really didn’t want or need to be wearing) when I had a conversation with my friend Lindsey, and she shared with me that she had been feeling much the same way and how refreshing it was to know she wasn’t alone. Then she shared with me that she’d been listening to a podcast called Fight Hustle, End Hurry by two preachers who had recently written two books about slowing down and culling the extra things in your life. I logged on as soon as I left the school and started listening. I was hooked. The show had just launched in October and was set to be an 11-week series about fighting hustle and ending hurry. Show topics included Hurry, Hustle, Silence, Sabbath, Simplicity, and Slowing Down – all things that I was in desperate need of. I couldn’t wait to hear the next episode. I couldn’t wait to hear these “radical” ideas about leaving your phone at home while you go to the grocery store, how to implement a Sabbath with your family, how to have a media detox (I recognize that none of these things are rocket science, but in this day and age, these ideas ARE radical).

As soon as I finished devouring the podcast, I bought both authors’ books and devoured those as well. Some of their ideas were so exciting that I couldn’t wait to get started. Some of these ideas were so “out there” that I was scared to give it a go (Sabbath and technology detox, for example – but more on that later). I decided it was time and we tried to make some changes. I talked to my family about how I was feeling and what I wanted to do about it, and we started making changes.

What I wanted to do most was to stop doing so many things, but that was thing that was hardest for me. All of the things we do as a family are GOOD THINGS. Scouts is good for character development, leadership, and social interaction. Chess is an intellectual pursuit that engages your mind in such a unique way and teaches sportsmanship, strategy, and decorum. Water polo is incredible stress relief for my ADHD, anxious child (as well as for my kiddo who doesn’t struggle with either of those things but benefits from water polo in many other ways) that teaches teamwork, critical life-saving skills (like treading water and just generally being comfortable in the water), and how to work hard for a common goal. Jeff Bethke and his wife go through a process annually where they write down all the things on index cards and put them down on the table. They have to make a conscientious choice to pick those things back up and keep them for the coming year. I was so not there. I couldn’t’ even write the things on index cards, much less ask my kids to give up anything. So we didn’t, but I slowly started taking off some of my hats – PTA for the junior high. Ok fine. I took off one hat, but then I got a second job, so that just shifted where my time was invested.

In February, I continued to pray in earnest for God to show me where we could cull, what things we could cut, how we could pare down our lives to slow down and enjoy life. I was really feeling convicted by the things that John Mark and Jeff were saying about the “pace of Jesus” and the “way of Jesus.” He came to this earth to show us how to live. Was he ever in a hurry? No. When Lazarus died? No. When Jairus’s daughter was sick? No. When giving the sermon on the mount? No – he literally stopped what he was saying to look at the birds of the air (Matthew 6:26) and to tell the people to do the same. Granted this illustration was exactly what he needed, but he goes on to consider the flowers (Matthew 6:28). In the middle of the most well-known sermon ever preached, Jesus is stopping to smell the flowers. He was SO not in a hurry. Add this to the list of things I need to learn from Jesus… As John Ortberg put it, “I cannot rest in God with a hurried soul.” Once again, convicted.

Even with all this knowledge and all this conviction, I still didn’t know what to DO about it. I couldn’t bring myself to cut our activities, but I did take a 14-day break from Facebook (more on that later). Following that, I left my phone at home to go to HEB (which was oddly liberating – I spoke to people in the aisles and took my time picking out my produce, which was SO 2019… we don’t even GO to the store anymore…). The scariest but most fruitful step of all, we practiced our very first Sabbath.

Here’s what that looked like: One Friday afternoon in late January, we all came home from school and work, finished all of our things for the week (emails, homework, reports, etc.), and we *turned off our phones.* We collected tablets from the kids and stored everything in the closet so we wouldn’t be tempted to check the weather or see who that text was from or check out Pinterest for a recipe. I had learned from Comer that Sabbath should be almost like a mini-Christmas where you celebrate, rest, enjoy your favorite meal, spend time together, pray, and just BE in the presence of each other and the Lord. I remember talking to my parents beforehand to let them know not to worry if they couldn’t reach us and my dad thought we’d gone a little nuts (you’re probably thinking the same thing). I had spent the day cleaning so that nobody would need to spend the weekend doing any chores (which my kids were 100% on board with). I went to the grocery store to get everything we needed for a delicious meal so we wouldn’t even need to leave the house.

Here’s what happened next: We prepared a meal together that was a mashup of everybody’s favorite things. We actually lit candles. I got out cloth napkins and the nice glasses and set the table. We locked the dogs out of the kitchen. We sat down at the table together and we prayed for God to bless our time of rest. We weren’t in a hurry to finish our meal because we had nowhere to go and nothing to get back to. We had a wonderful conversation (I had some “scripted” questions I had prepared so that we wouldn’t go down some rabbit hole of Minecraft or Magic the Gathering or of whatever YouTube video we were obsessed with at the time). We talked about what we were looking forward to during this weekend of rest and what we were nervous about – I was worried my parents would need help and wouldn’t be able to get in touch, but thankfully, that didn’t happen. We finished our meal, cleaned up together, and sat down to play our favorite game. We may have stayed up a little later than usual with plans to sleep in the next day. Saturday was a lowkey day, so lowkey I don’t remember what we did or what we ate. I do know we slept in, read, and went for a walk. Sounds lovely, yes? Our Sabbath ended Sunday after church, so not quite 48 hours. We all agreed it was something we wanted to do again, so we scheduled one for February (which looked remarkably like the January Sabbath – kind of like Christmas, we have traditions we want to repeat over and over again… no need to recreate the wheel every time we do this!).

Enter March… remember what I was saying about being too scared to put all of our index cards on the kitchen table? Ha. Ha ha. Ha ha ha. Every index card we’d ever thought we “needed” was casually ripped out of our hands and tossed in a pile on the kitchen table. No warning. No gradual reordering of priorities. Everything ceased to exist except for the things that actually matter most. When I had my mini meltdown in the foothills of the Ozarks in November, I could have in no way imagined the steps that I would take in the coming 4 months that would lead me to a place of perfect peace and acceptance of the crazy that was the pandemic of 2020. Let me be clear – this is NOT what I prayed for when I asked God to help me slow down but it sure did do the trick. While all the index cards were on the table, a natural reordering took place. Chess club stopped. Scouts stopped. Water polo stopped. Running club stopped. Small group moved to a virtual format and Daniel was able to participate in Bible study for the first time in almost a year. Guess what moved to the top of our priority list for 2020? Church, family time at home, and lots and lots of reading. Guess what we weren’t doing anymore? Everything else. Guess what happened? We all learned to breathe again.

When things started to gradually open, we saw no need to reengage in many of them. I am no longer married to a schedule. In fact, I haven’t even put February in my bullet journal yet. We learned to sleep in a little. We learned to walk more places. We learned to slow down, which was my initial desperate plea with God and the universe. Who knew it would take a pandemic to help me reorder my life? While I’m not grateful for the pandemic, I am grateful for some of the changes it has forced into our lives. Here’s an example…

Last weekend, we took a trip to San Antonio to spend some time together (our work schedules didn’t align – I worked Thanksgiving and Christmas; Doug worked New Years). We hopped in the car on New Years Day and drove to San Antonio. It took us over 6 hours make a ~3ish hour drive with an unscheduled stop in Schulenberg for black-eyed peas and cabbage at Schobel’s. Pre-pandemic Sheri would have been in the race of her life to beat Google Maps’ ETA to our hotel with a detailed agenda of where we were eating when we got there, what activities we would do while we were there, and a minute-by-minute plan with maps, links, and apps to help us along the way. Post-pandemic (or mid-pandemic…?) Sheri just got in the car and started driving west. We had no itinerary, no apps, no maps, no links, and no problems. Prior to covid, we would have flown through the Bucee’s and eaten trail mix and beef jerky so we could make better time. In 2021, that’s not the pace I’m living, and I am SO grateful. Those peas at Schobel’s were top-notch and we enjoyed our conversation at the table rather than shoving food in our faces as we drove, watched movies, and played games in our own little worlds. On Saturday, we woke up, Googled “breakfast in San Antonio,” and walked to the oldest restaurant in SA. We enjoyed our breakfast (so much so that we went back on Sunday…) and started walking. Eleven miles later, we had seen 3 of the missions along the mission trails and decided we were ready to eat lunch. The original plan was to hike all 5 missions and Uber back to the room. Pre-pandemic Sheri would have accepted nothing less. Post-pandemic Sheri called an Uber at mission #3 and took us to lunch and called it a day. While I won’t say it was a perfect day (kids are still whiny and ungrateful, even when on vacation with a more chilled out version of their mom than they’ve seen in a while), I can see indicators everywhere that I’ve made some positive changes that are affecting our overall lives in a Gospel way.

When we got home, I decided it was time to listen to the Fight Hustle, End Hurry podcast again. I argued that I didn’t get a fair shot at implementing their ideas because COVID did it for me. After one episode, I have decided to take another Facebook sabbatical. I don’t know how long I’ll be gone or if I’ll even be able to return. Last time I did this, I only took 2 weeks off and I had a hard time returning. The pace of life in the real world was incongruent with the pace of life in social media and I felt like I had woken up in a different time than the one I had left 2 weeks prior. Given today’s social climate, I’m fearful (hopeful?) that a break will see such drastic changes in the social media world that I will feel like  Brendan Fraser in Encino Man and I won’t understand the world around me. I’ll wake up thinking I can drink directly from slurpie machines and then Lord only know what might happen next (if you didn’t get that one, it’s ok).

For now, I plan to write weekly, post photos via Instagram for our far and away families, and try to enjoy a slower, less outraged pace of life. I hope you’ll keep in touch in other ways besides social media. While I so enjoy getting to see what everyone is up to, I enjoy my sanity and a relaxed pace of life even more than that. Send me a text. Invite me to coffee. Take a walk with me. I hope to hear from you soon.