Driving past the Nebraska state sign on that snow-covered day, with the windows rolled up, the heater blasting and my babies bundled up in the backseat, I wondered: what does that mean? The Good Life?
What we’d left behind was good, too. I didn’t doubt that God had good things planned ahead of us. I just wondered how He would do it.
Everything was so… different. Fear and expectation fought for first place in my mind as I watched the endless, open miles flow past my window. The sun reflecting off the rolling snowy fields made them almost look like the Pacific Ocean I knew so well. But no, this wasn’t California. It was “flat and frozen” as my mother-in-law would say when we later sent her a picture.
Six months later, when we made that same drive, we’d see fields of corn dancing in the wind. Cows grazing lazily in the sun. Stars that were thicker, and brighter, and nearer than they’d ever been. And we’d finally realize: this place has its own kind of beauty. But on that first day, that day of endless snow and shivering realizations that it was too late to turn back – I was mostly scared. Scared, and wondering: How, God? How are You going to do this?
In the end, though we did learn to appreciate the Midwest’s natural beauty, it wasn’t the natural beauty that made Nebraska a Good place for us to be. It was the people. I shouldn’t have been surprised. After all, wasn’t it only after God made Adam and Eve that He saw fit to rest from all His work? Shouldn’t it be relationships with His children that would help redeem our time there?
But I was surprised. I was surprised by the way one friend, when I called her for help because I needed to take my daughter to the Emergency Room, showed up within seven minutes, ready to watch my other two children. I was surprised by the way another friend, when I had to say “no” to helping with the ministry she valued deeply, understood, and loved me anyway. And I was surprised again when my five year-old requested a birthday party at the last minute, and a new friend showed up without batting an eye, armed with smiles and hugs and her beautiful boys and sunglasses for birthday gifts. I was surprised – and, I’m ashamed to admit it now, a little bit irritated – by the way every clerk in every store saw a customer as a chance to chat. Now I miss that unhurried small talk and the way it wove connection through everyday life.
Now we are back on the West Coast. Life in the Sandhills was a short season for us, but an important one. My husband asked me recently, “When do you think you’ll write about Nebraska?” And the way he said when, not if, told me that it was something I had to do. But what to write about?
I’ll write about the lessons learned, because I don’t ever want to forget them. I’ll write about what made it a Good Life. Starting with Togetherness.
The night I really saw what Togetherness meant for my friends was the night before I had to leave. My husband had already been transferred, and it was up to the kids and I to finish packing, to clean the house, to say our goodbyes. And I learned that when the going gets tough, Nebraska women don’t give up, they show up. We gathered in my kitchen, sharing pizza and packing dishes, corralling kids and offering quick words of encouragement. As I watched the way they rolled up their sleeves and simply did what needed to be done, I thought back to the preceding months. The layoffs had come to the company that employed all our husbands… the layoffs, and then the transfers. My family wasn’t the first to be sent away, nor would we be the last. But when the rumors had started, my friends had voiced their fears; voiced them, prayed over them, but not wallowed in them. Because there was work to be done.
Yes, lots of work to be done, and we needed each other, I thought, as the last woman left on Packing and Pizza night. We were different. Very, very different. But it was what we had in common that brought us together. We loved Jesus. We loved our children. And we needed each other. What we had in common turned out to be enough to forge Togetherness.
“Bear one another’s burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ.” ~Galatians 6:2
Clinging to the One who brings us together,
Laura