pieces and ponderings

I just waved good-bye to my three men:  Bryan Darling, child number 1, and child number 3.  They won’t be gone for long…they are just going on a bike ride.  It’s not a parting that’s a big deal.  I’m just feeling very thankful right now, having watched them drive off in my husband’s truck, with bikes in the back and plenty of water and ice in cooler  jugs.

Bryan Darling just got home last night, after being gone for 2 weeks serving his Army reserve duty.  He had a long day of travel…driving an hour from the Army base to the airport, where he discovered his first travel delay, which meant that his flight at the connecting airport would also be delayed.

That last flight, the one that was supposed to bring him to the airport that is about 10 minutes from our home, where I was going to be waiting at the gate with children numbers 1-5, was cancelled.  He tried getting on other flights to other close-by airports, but to no avail.  He tried to rent a car to drive the rest of the way home, but that didn’t work either.  He was stuck on stand-by, waiting to see if he might win the “you-get-a-seat-lottery” on a late night flight.

All of our little “welcome home” plans got scrubbed…and my heart shrunk at the knowledge that he would not be arriving in our town at 5:39 central standard time.  I had been waiting for 5:39 p.m. central standard time on Friday, June 17, 2011, for two weeks now.  I think that maybe I was waiting for this specific time for a week before he left.

And I came face to face with what I know is true, but can usually mask as I go about daily routines and taking care of kids and house and phone lines and blogs and stuff…I miss him terribly when he is away.  My heart aches when he is in one place and I am in another.  I find myself having to get outside in the evenings to let God’s creation quiet and still and refresh my thoughts when it’s around the time that he is supposed to be coming home.  I really, really, really love him…and I can’t really separate who I am apart from him.

So this morning, I’m thankful that he won the “you-get-a-seat-lottery” and he walked through the airport gate at a later time last night.  I’m thankful that he told me “good-night” in person and not over the phone.  And I’m thankful for the sheepish little-boy look that I got this morning as he was watching his sons filling their water bottles and hefting their bikes into the back of the truck.  He looked at me as he remarked to them, “I would go with you, if your mom didn’t mind.”

“You should go,” I replied.

A smile spread across his face as he went in search of old athletic shoes to wear, since his are in a bag somewhere in the deep recesses of the Atlanta airport.

“Welcome home,” I thought as I watched my men drive away, on this lovely Saturday morning, where I’m pretty certain that the sun is shining a little brighter and the sky is definitely a more brilliant shade of blue.