I promise they won’t always be this serious…

It’s slowly taking ahold of me.  The itch.  The restlessness.  The constant tickle of desire to be moving on, to be somewhere I’m not.  That’s just what happens.  Sometimes it takes a few weeks; when life is exciting it takes a few years.   But sooner or later, the place I’m at just doesn’t seem nearly as fascinating as…oh any number of other places.  Right now I’m anxious to be back in Argentina, back to the stress and the dirt and the offbeat rhythm of my real life.  To have a place to live that’s more or less mine (however lacking in amenities it may be).  To be working together with my husband again.  To be working on something that really matters.  To have (oh blessed thought) long term goals again.  I’ve missed long term goals.  I want to speak Spanish, walk on dirt streets, greet everyone I know with a kiss, drink mate with someone besides myself and do it with a huge pile of facturas that I bought right down the street.  Yep, I’m actually dreaming of Argentina.  Oh, and I’m also dreaming of Ireland.  I know it’s ridiculous, but I’m just American enough to think that six months in Ireland writing a novel and sitting in a pub every night sounds like heaven.  Well, okay then, I just proved I’m willing to embarrass myself on this blog.  Excellent.

If I were a really good missionary, this would be the part where I transition into a profound thought about the importance of being content in each and every moment just where we are.  But the biggest thing I’ve learned in the last five years is that I’m a terrible missionary.  And the biggest thing I’ve come to peace with in the last five months is that being a terrible missionary is exactly what God wants of me.  When I thought I was a good missionary, it was offensive to Him.  He went to some serious trouble to disabuse me of that idea.  It’s all tied up in that strength being perfect in weakness thing.  In any case, I’m so relieved and happy to find myself actually wanting that scary old life again that for once I have no intention of worrying about my discontent.  It feels so good to be restless.  It feels like me again.