I'M THIRSTY!

A lot has happened over the last few weeks and we’ve been extremely busy.  I have a lot I want to share with you but I need to give you two disclaimers.  One, I have to start from the beginning to really help you to understand and two, I know it will seem as if I’m only talking about how I feel and my own opinions but truth be told, I really hope all of this blesses you. 

For past several years, something far in my periphery has been calling me and recently I can’t help but see a little flicker in the metaphorical corner of my eye and turn my head to find what it is.  I’ve felt for some time a restlessness with our way of life and our habits.  God has blessed us with a fine home, good jobs, three beautiful and healthy children.  These are real blessings and I’m thankful for them.  I’m also thankful for modern things like medicine, scientific advancements and the fact that information and answers to my questions is right at my fingertips because of technology. 

I got married to the man I love, I went to school to get a good job, I bought a house in suburbia I don’t really like because that’s just what you do at that point in your life.  You get married, you buy a house you can’t afford and you try to live a life like your parents or grandparents only in warp speed building a mountain of debt and painting trendy shades of beige and grey with white chair rails. 

I live in a city surrounded by other cities.  We are a suburb of a much larger city and part of a metroplex, which has always sounded to me like the name of some giant evil robot….  We have the same chain stores that neighbor the exact same other chain stores that the next city and sometimes the next neighborhood has.  We have the same big name store that shares a strip with the same hair cut place, vitamin store and frozen yogurt shop. 

As builders build and our area expands at a break neck pace it’s easy to predict what little stores and restaurants might fill the empty leases surrounding the bigger grocery or department stores. 

A lot of women in what I refer to as my peer group are interested in the same trendy things.  They, upon first glance, seem to like the same styles, the same parenting books, the same approach to life; they seem to have an awful lot in common and ride the same trends. 

Where I live most of the nice, new, comfortable houses look an awful lot alike; two story brick homes with colonial revival replications, narrow entrances and small, garden style back yards with a play set crammed in there somewhere on Saint Augustine sod.  They have broad wooden garage doors and curving driveways and mimic the eerily similar home three doors down; same floor plans with visible alterations of taste not unlike adult identical twins.  On the inside they are likely painted in the newish slate or smoke shade with bold white chair rails and in a few years will be painted another trendy color. 

Now, I will tell you that each of the occupants of these houses are unique.  I know this to be true and that likely, they picked their style with pride as I know I would have too when given the choice.  Maybe this is their first home or a dreamed about upgrade and maybe they’re really excited to be so close to “x” big store and “y, Y and yy” smaller chain stores.  I get it.  I’ve been there and sometimes I still am right there. 

The choices we make in this life, especially where we live and spend our hard earned money are not to be taken lightly and I would never find fault with any one family or individual that has moved in to these suburban homes surrounding me nor those who frequent all the shops because of a lifestyle and societal default, I do too. 

That flicker, though?  Remember?  That thing that keeps pulling at my heart?  That thing that keeps me unsettled when I should be satisfied?  That thing has made me take pause over and over.  I am so grateful to God for where we live and the easiness of it.  When my kids have been sick, I’m so close to the urgent care.  When we needed new shoes and suits for my young sons when they needed to attend their Meema’s funeral five years ago, you bet I was glad to have umpteen billions choices of places to find black dress socks in sizes “overgrown toddler” and “Big foot preschooler”.  I am not turning my nose up at that.  Not at all.  I’m just saying that for years now, something has been tugging at me, bothering me, about this whole set up. 

So, I’m going to skip ahead a bit.  Going to the store and buying things gives me no satisfaction at all whatsoever other than providing food for my family’s table and toothbrushes for their teeth.  There is no joy in pulling up to the Walmart pick up and having someone loading up my car with groceries, cleaning items and toiletries other than I didn’t have to shop for said items with 3 kids in tow. 

You know what does give me a great deal of satisfaction?  Joy?  Making things with my own two hands that actually serve those I love. 

Have you ever cooked a meal from scratch?  You didn’t use cream of whatever soup, or prepackaged anything and just gathered the bare ingredients and made something edible and enjoyable?  Now, I don’t knock a good casserole or prepackaged whatever, but I think if you’ve ever done the “scratch” thing and if you ever do it most of the time, like me, it has a wealth of blessings and benefits. 

For any man reading this…. I’m trying to think of something manly that’s a parallel….have you ever built something?  I mean, I know we love the power tools and all the hoopla that goes along with a build, but freeze in your mind that pride in your finished product. 

As a society, or at least as I see society, we are completely lacking in the pride and strength that comes with doing something on your own, from scratch or from the beginning.  This thing that is bothering me is that everything is the same and we’re all ok with that!  When something breaks, there’s another one just like it available for purchase down the road or on amazon.  When you’re tired of your curtains, you go buy new ones.  So many things just seem so bland, so replaceable.  I don’t want to be ok with that anymore.  I know that this is not what God has intended for me. 

I just spent the week on a last minute camping trip.  Then, I stayed with my husband overnight with a beloved aunt so we could be at a fishing excursion the next morning.  I enjoyed great chatting under the stars on a porch in the country.  I made camp pancakes and chorizo tacos.  I swam in a lake with my dog.  I caught giant blue catfish and channel cats.  I worked hard this week.  We hiked, swam, fished and were outside the majority of the time.  I logged over 20,000 steps on most days and got really filthy and sweaty.  You know what?  I feel amazing!  My face is sunburnt I’ve got a ton of housework to catch up on and I’m really tired, but it has filled my heart up with joy.  I want all weeks to be like this one. 

Now, realistically, there are real things we have to do.  My husband has to go back to work on Monday and we have to start up our schoolwork for the week.  We’ve got to clean up and get to church tomorrow.  Bills have to be paid and obligations have to be met. 

I’ve spoken before about not being a jellyfish.  I don’t want to be a jellyfish.  I don’t want to be unintentional in my life, every moment is precious and no day should be taken for granted and I mean this in a completely non-carpe-diem-spring-break-deranged-college-kid kind of way.  I mean I want to get back to the basics, to simplicity to the wholeness that pioneering or homesteading can bring to one’s heart and soul.  This is why I share this, the camping, the homeschooling, the homesteading experiments the infatuation with pioneer life. 

This is why I write this blog.  This is why I started the YouTube channel and this is why I’m putting myself out “there”.  I want to share this with you!  I don’t want you to be afraid to try or to accept what everyone else is doing just because everyone else is doing it.  I want you to do you and I want you to own it.  I don’t want you or me to paint our house in the same trendy colors just because they’re trendy.  I don’t want us to just run down to the store 3 times a week because we’re out of something.  I don’t want us to be dependent nor complacent.  Let’s buck up, buttercup and have some fun!  God made us capable and unique.

That thing in my periphery, that unsettling feeling in my soul was a thirst.  It was a thirst to be more intentional, the live, to work, to thrive and take pride in the accountability and responsibility I have in taking care of myself and my own. 

I am thirsty.  When I get back to basics and nature that thirst is partially quenched and I am determined to help you see that too! 

I’m thirsty for something I can pass down to my children besides how to play on my iPhone or make a Walmart order.  I think about the women that have come before me that have passed down their God given gifts and knowledge, that showed me how to sew, to crochet, to cook, what’s good for an ear infection when you don’t go to the doctor, how to grow carrots, how to work hard and not complain; how to laugh and laugh hard. 

Sometimes when I look at myself not only is what I do just like everyone else, this homogenous non-descript existence, it is completely void of anything special to pass down to my children.  Now, that may sound a bit harsh, but people of my generation, what are you teaching your kids?  Let’s pass something on that’s bigger, better and full of the life, hope and spirit that God intended for your life and for theirs.  Get out and LIVE!

Please share this blog.  It’s my lifeline and I hope that it will continue to grow into something that blesses you and others around you.  I prayed when I first started this and as I continue that I might be an encouragement to others, I hope I am to you. 

Please subscribe to the YouTube channel.  If you’re able please support it through Patreon and/or PayPal. Your support helps get me out there, lets me spread the word online, helps with supplies and transportation.  I can’t do this without you.  If you can’t contribute in those ways I understand!  Please comment, like and share the heck out of this material.  I love your comments, I’d love new ideas and missions.  New things to conquer!  Let me know what you think!  Let’s get to work!      

Thank you from the bottom of my heart for reading, supporting and watching. 

Here’s a link to the YouTube channel, the patreon site:

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCA8hbVN8FVXuOIPbE_jK6LQ?view_as=subscriber

https://www.patreon.com/user?u=11109553