All my bags are packed, I’m ready to go….(Yeah, it’s a old song)

I’m writing this in Heathrow International, London, waiting on the last leg of our trip to Norway to see our second precious bundle in the form of a granddaughter.  Naturally, I’m drinking English Breakfast Tea.  My body doesn’t really know what time it is, although my watch says it’s going on 2PM here, which means it’s close to 8AM back home in the Show Me State, so I guess breakfast tea is still appropriate…somewhere.  We had a few complications due to wind in Chicago, (also appropriate, if you know Chicago), as well as human and technological mishaps—such is international travel I am told—but compared to what could go wrong, these things are merely inconveniences.Plus the end result of seeing our daughter and her beautiful family makes it all worth while anyway.  A great analogy itself.

So the well-named “Windy City” caused an impromptu extended (8-hour) lay-over in London, with our site seeing restricted to the post-security part of the airport, which is infested with shops like Rolex and Harrods and World Duty Free, (certainly all the things that I would fly thousands of miles to see in London).  Needless to say, sleeping on a plane is a more of a gift than a finely honed skill, which neither my husband nor I have.  So here is Bob trying to recharge his battery:

…while others are finding the recharging stations for their e-devices throughout the airport like this: 

Funny how our technology is smart enough to tell us when they’re almost out of juice, red-flagging themselves at, say, 15% or so, and counting down from there.  I have no excuse if I just keep using my computer until it dies.  I’m waiting for an e-device that says, “I told you so, stupid!”  So now, even on the airplane, I could plug in my phone or laptop if I needed to and keep in touch, keep working, keep doing whatever I feel is just soooOOO000ooo acutely important.

But not so the human machine.  I don’t like to admit I’m as frail as that.  Historically, I haven’t listened well to what my body, my mind, or my heart may have been saying, even screaming at me, and unfortunately, I didn’t come with a battery power gauge. Neither did my children, nor my husband.  Nor my friends.  I have to discern the signs!

“Then Jesus said, ‘Come to me, all of you who are weary and carry heavy burdens, and I will give you rest.'” 

News flash: we are weary, and we are heavy laden.  It’s just a matter of time until we find out just how much.  But by then it might be too late.  Life has a way of sucking up a lot internal power fast, and sometimes without much warning.  The recharge is a process that is crucial, both a gift and a skill, and for a Christian, it’s an important part of being His disciple.  

….Addendum: Okay, we’re in the air flying home FROM Heathrow right now.  This time we actually caught our connecting flight on time and somehow, the nice young couple’s active two-year-old behind us has (finally) fallen asleep…temporarily.  Kinda looking forward to laying down our own heavy burdens (in the form of carry-ons) and throwing these weary but very happy grandparenting bodies into our own beds in the coming several hours.

(Oops.  The two-year-old just woke up.  Some grandparent loves him somewhere.)

[**Written during our trip in March 2017 with few edits.  We had a BLAST!!]

Matthew 11:28  Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.