Anywhere but here...

Des Moines is a dismal place beginning about this time of year and running all the way through, say, JUNE. I grew up in Texas and Oklahoma (YAY SOONERS); my sister lives in Arlington, TX and my parents live in the northeast Texas town of Paris. My birthday (November 14) was always a beautiful time of year, with all the sweetgum trees brilliantly aflame... but here, by the time it's my birthday, it's usually already snowed and all the leaves are gone. Think Simon & Garfunkel's "Hazy Shade of WInter" here.

Every summer I travel to a small village on the southern coast of Haiti to teach music for a week at a music camp. Although Haiti is definitely NOT Club Med by any stretch, I've come to crave the feel of the Caribbean sun.

I often travel to Nashville, Tennessee as well, because I write for a Christian publishing house there (Lifeway). It's such a COOL place, with so much to do.

Then I come back to Des Moines and think... man, can I just be anywhere but HERE?

I love my new job, but mainly because it's so completely DIFFERENT than anything I've been doing since I moved to Des Moines nine years ago. Maybe God knew I was getting sick of this place and gave me a Monty Python "And now for something completely different" moment.

My husband, who's been on staff at a church here since we came, just recently resigned (I heartily approved the move -- more about that some other time). He's been on staff in a church somewhere for thirty years (he's in his early 50s, I'm in my late 30s). Now we're just kind-of drifting around, visiting different churches. The publishing house I write for requires me to be a member of a particular denomination, so I'm sort-of wedged in. I'm still pondering all my options...