You Only Pass This Way Once

My dad retired from Wycliffe Bible Translators after 44 years of service.

Posted by David at 03:10 PM | Comments (0)

Too Much HGTV Watching

We live across from the Green Bay Packer house. This is exactly what we were hoping wouldn't happen in our neighborhood. I can't believe the colors were approved by the developer.

Posted by David at 02:23 PM

Checking In

Just in case you're wondering, we're still here. Life is moving along, good things are happening, and we all are well. More later, or should that be, soon?

Posted by David at 08:20 AM

What A Year!

It's New Year's day, and I've just finished reading through all the Christmas cards and year end letters that have been sent to us. We've been blessed by some amazing people this past year. We're blessed with a wonderful Christian family--parents, brothers, grandparents, uncles and aunts, cousins--a unique Christian heritage that is a gift from God. We're blessed to have made some new friends in Idaho. We're blessed by a ministry partnership team who pray and give to make it possible for us to work full time with Mission Aviation Fellowship.

I can't say that I've really thought about a New Year's resolutions. I guess the one thing that I want to focus on is the ability and resolve to change things in my life that need to be worked on. When I was younger change came more easily. Now that I'm a bit older, I find that change doesn't come so easily.

So much as happened for our family in this past year. A trip to Sumatra for David, finishing a major wireless networking project in Shell, packing up our house in Ecuador, giving away our three pets, saying goodbye to so many good friends, moving back to the US, finding an apartment in a new state, finding a new church to attend, new schools for the boys, raising our ministry support, selling a house, buying a house, setting up a new home...what a year! Yes, it was very stressful at times, but through it all we knew God's presence and provision. We praise Him!

Posted by David at 11:21 AM

Bird's Eye View

Just for fun, here's a web cam view of Overland Road in Boise, just down from Lowes. The image is courtesy of the Ada County Highway District.

Posted by David at 01:15 PM

Endless Trips

I must yet again make a trip to Lowes. I bought the last two knobs for the kitchen cupboards, and arrived home with only one. It's a long story as to why it's taken so many trips to get these knobs and how I lost this one, so I won't go into it. Suffice it to say, I don't expect things to go like this in the States. If I were still in Ecuador, it wouldn't surprise me at all to have to make three or four trips to the hardware store for what should be a simple job. But here it seems to be all the more aggravating because it shouldn't be so difficult. It's a good thing Lowes is only ten minutes away.

Posted by David at 11:04 AM

Winter Days

Yesterday I found myself wishing for a hot humid day in Shell and a swim in the cold clear water of the Rio Alpayacu. Alas, no such luck here. Here we have cloudy skies and cold rain. The bright side of it is that I'm going to take the boys snowboarding one of these days. It's snowed twice in Boise so far this winter, and the boys had a blast each time. They missed the snow.

It appears that I'm just about done with the task of hanging pictures and things on the wall for Ellyn. I still need to finish putting pulls and knobs on drawers and cupboard doors in the kitchen, and should do that today. We are very comfortably settled into our new home, and finding it to be very livable. What does that mean you ask? It means we like the floor plan and it works well for us. There are a lot of things about it that we've never had in a home before.

We're learning to live with the thermostat turned down, and I'm not looking forward to seeing the gas bill for a full month. We did get one for the first week that we moved in, and it wasn't a pretty sight!

Posted by David at 10:53 AM

Next Steps

We are in a different world at our house. Well, let me start by saying we are in a different house. What makes it a different world is the fact that we have no access to the Internet at this time. I'm writing this entry on Thursday, December 8, and will post it when I have access again. Actually, now that I think about it, that will most likely be tonight. But, let me back up first.

Ellyn flew to Portland last Thursday for her aunt's wedding. We woke up that morning to about three inches of snow, and it was still falling. I went to the men's Bible study at church that morning, leaving a few minutes early so I'd have enough time to drive in the snow. I also needed to stop at the grocery store since it was my turn to bring donuts. It had been years since I'd driven in snow, but it wasn't bad at all. The fact that I was in a small front wheel drive car on flat roads made a big difference. I thought about staying home so I could drive the boys to school instead of Ellyn, but I figured she could make it. Besides, she's going to have to start driving in snow sometime, so it might as well be right away.

She made it to school and back fine, but the round trip took almost an hour longer than it normally did. As soon as she arrived back at the apartment we loaded her bag into the car and left for the airport. By then things were calming down and the temperature was warming up, so there was no trouble getting to the airport. Her flight left on schedule, and she was off for a weekend of fun with family.

On Friday the fun started. I drove the boys to school for one last time. Once I was back home I loaded the loaded the van and then headed over to the house. We had our final walk-through that day, and I met the builder for that at 11:30 AM. Soon after that I had the appliances delivered. Dustin walked home from school that afternoon, and I drove over to get Taylor, since I hadn't told him to walk. Actually, I thought I'd be done at the house by the time he was out of school, but it didn't happen that way. First, the appliance delivery was late, and then when they got to the dryer, the found they had a gas dryer with them, and we had bought an electric dryer. Fortunately they had the right one in the warehouse, and a second truck brought that over.

By 5 PM I dropped Taylor off at Ellyn's cousin's house, and Dustin and I went to meet Ellyn's cousin at the business he manages. His name is Dustin Todd, which is interesting, because our Dustin's full name is Dustin Todd Hoffman. Oh, and Dustin (Ellyn's cousin) has a son who is also Dustin, but they call him DJ (good thing, or we'd really be confused!). Anyway, Dustin Todd had told us he'd like to help us move, and he could use the Isuzu box van from his place of work. So once we met him, we headed over to a couple different stores to pick up a table and chairs that we had bought months ago, and a mattress set that we bought last week. When those were loaded up we headed over to the apartment to empty some things out of our storage garage and make a decent load of it. I suppose we finished with that around 9 PM.

I must have been up well past midnight on Friday, as I finished putting everything in boxes. Ellyn had done a great job of boxing most things up, but I needed to finish packing my things, and the boys and I threw our clothes in some boxes. Dustin and I had taken our mattress set that evening, so I slept on a spare twin mattress. One last night in what had been our home for five months. It had been a great place for us, and we have no complaints about our stint of apartment living. If you're looking for a good apartment complex in Meridian, try Aspen Hills.

At 8:30 AM three couples from our new church showed up with four vehicles. Dustin Todd also brought the box van over again. I had already filled our van earlier in the morning. We managed to get almost everything over to our house in one trip. What a blessing to have so much help. At first I thought we might have too much help, but it turned out to be just right. I think we were all unloaded from that first trip by 11 AM, and I said goodbye to everyone and thanked them. All except Dustin Todd. He and I headed back to the apartment for a last trip. I was extremely grateful for so much help.

I won't go into all the details that followed, but needless to stay, it's been busy around here as we unpack and set up. We picked Ellyn up from the airport on Sunday afternoon. The boys were looking forward to seeing what she would do when she got home. I had done quite a bit on Saturday evening, but hey knew that their mom could make the mess look like a home. They were right, and by Sunday evening the place was looking great. The last few days have been a blur of unpacking boxes, making bed frames, hanging things on walls, installing blinds, building dining room chairs, and many other things I can't remember.

We're the second family to move into a finished house in this phase of our sub-division. As I write, the street is full of trucks of all descriptions, as workers frame for foundations, put on siding, load sheetrock into houses, frame houses, paint, plumb, and who knows what else. The lot on one side of us is still empty, and on the other side they will be pouring the foundation next week. We're going to hear the sounds of construction for some time to come.

We are so thankful that we can be here for Christmas. The boys are very happy to be closer to school. They can walk or ride their bike. The temps the past two days have been in the low teens on my thermometer, and they are grateful for a ride on those days. I heard on the radio it was six degrees in downtown Boise this morning. Brrrrrr!!! That's cold for us, MKs who have just returned from the tropics. We're walking around our new house in awe, and that is certainly keeping our minds off the cold weather. Taylor is desperately wishing for snow. He can't think of much else. From what I gather, a snow fall of a couple inches doesn't happen all that often in Boise. For his sake, I hope it's a snowier winter than usual.

The other big news for us is that we are now at 100% of our full monthly ministry support. Back in August we made out a plan with some goals, and thought that reaching our ministry partnership goal in December was possible. We've been praying toward that, and God has been faithful. On December 1 we ended our deputation time, and I am now back to work for the Information Technology department. This has been a long time of transition for us since we left Ecuador in June, and we are excited to start the next step. We are also full of praise to God because He is so good. There is so much peace in resting in Him, especially when you are in such a time of transition as we have been.

Posted by David at 02:21 PM

Last Day

We signed loan and title papers on Wednesday. Yesterday Ellyn flew to Portland for her aunt's wedding, and she will be back on Sunday. Today I have the final walk through of the house with the builder. I think they've been slowed down the last couple days by cold weather, and I hope everything is good for us to move in. I do know there is still some outside painting to do. Yesterday we had several inches of snow, which was bad for builders, but good for boys who haven't played in the snow for over five years.

Today is the last day for us all to get up and drive the boys across town to school. We made it. It's been a long three months of doing that, and we're ready for this stage to come to a close.

Posted by David at 06:44 AM

Old Routine

We're having snow flurries today. Taylor is hoping it will really snow. I took the boys to school this morning, and we have only three more days to do that. We are all so ready to live closer to the schools. It has been so worth it to do what we did, but it's taking it's toll.

This morning the three of us pile in the car at 7 AM (Ellyn stayed home in bed, sleeping a little longer because she's working two different jobs today) and headed off to school. Before we arrived at the middle school, Taylor had fallen asleep in the back seat. I dropped Dustin off and then drove over to the house to wait there for a while and read my book. After a while Taylor woke up, so we drove over to the grocery store just down the street to buy a few donuts. We drove over to his school's parking lot and ate those. I finally say goodbye to him at 8:40 AM and arrive back home around 9 AM.

That's been our morning routine for the past three months. And, we repeat that in the afternoon, picking up Dustin first and waiting an hour for Taylor. So that is four hours of time and almost 36 miles of driving daily that we won't have to do any more once we are in the new house. Bottom line is that the boys are getting to stay in the same school all year long, and we see that as a very good thing.

This ends up being a big week for us. We have an appointment with the title company on Wednesday to take care of financing. Ellyn flies out to her aunt's wedding in Portland on Thursday. So if we don't get all the signatures done on Wednesday, I'll be getting power of attorney to take care of whatever I need to on Friday. Friday will be the final walk through. I also anticipate the building getting the certificate of occupancy that day, which is key because the lender won't fund until we get that. If all that goes smoothly, I'll be moving over there on Saturday. We've been blessed because there are a couple families from church and also Ellyn's cousin who will be helping us move. Ellyn will arrive home on Sunday afternoon, and we'll spend next week settling in.

Dustin and Taylor are looking forward to living close to school. They both will be about a half mile from school. Taylor plans to ride his bike every day. We'll see what he thinks about that when it's freezing outside! At least he'll get to sleep in an hour later every morning. Dustin won't get to sleep much more than he does now, but at least he won't have to wait in the car for an hour in the afternoons.

Posted by David at 10:43 AM

Snowing!

We had snow tonight. Not a lot, maybe a little less than half an inch. But it certainly was enough to get the boys outside to throw a few snowballs and build a couple mini snowmen. This is their first snowfall in over five years, and they weren't going to waste any of it. For Taylor, this is like his first time to experience snow. His last winter was when he was four years old. He actually learned to ski that year, and did very well. He'll have to start over again at that, because I'm sure he doesn't remember too much of it. Actually, he wants to snowboard, not ski. He visited the Bogus Basin web site the other day, and was shocked to learn how expensive lift tickets are.

Posted by David at 12:33 AM

Getting Closer

We closed escrow on the sale of our California house on November 18. That puts us one step further towards the end of our long transition. The house in Boise should be ready by December 2, and I'm working on the loan for that right now. I think we'll be in the new house in a week and a half. We're so excited.

The bad news is that Ellyn won't be in town on the day we move, and I know the thought of that is killing her. But, her aunt, who she is very close to, is getting married in Portland on December 2, and she won't miss that wedding for the world. The wedding is bad timing for us, but on the positive side, at least Ellyn is close enough to be able to get to the wedding. If we were still in Ecuador, she wouldn't be going.

Posted by David at 10:42 PM

Change and Snow

I was in the car with the boys today and we saw our first snow in five years that wasn't on a volcano. It snowed on the mountains north and south of Boise last night. Only a dusting, but enough to let us know winter is coming. The other day I found myself trying to explain to someone how it was being in Boise. I realized that I was going through a double change--moving back to the US after living in Ecuador for five years is a big change. What makes the change even greater is that we didn't move back to Oakhurst, or California, but to a state we'd never even been to before. Good thing we like it here!

This long period of waiting, of being in transition, is getting old for me. We've been back in the US for almost five months, and we're now very close to moving into a permanent home. This little apartment has been good to us, but it will be good to make a 'real' home here. The sale of the house in California is moving along, and I'm so thankful we have a buyer. It hardly seems possible that just three weeks ago I was getting very nervous that we wouldn't have an offer in time. Although I'm getting weary of the waiting time, lots of good things are happening.

The other large focus is our support raising, and we are now at 81% of our monthly amount. We have plateaued this past week, and we are praying to see more progress. Two more months, as we pray to be at 100% by the end of the year. I'm really looking forward to 2006 and getting to work on something other than support raising.

Posted by David at 09:21 PM

Praise Songs

Just got back from the Light in the Night event sponsored by Calvary Chapel. Listened to the Christian bands Hawk Nelson, Grand Prize, Olivia the band, and Manafest. Jonah 33 was to be there, but couldn't make it. Probably a good thing, 'cause after several hours I was going deaf. This just wasn't my kind of music--Christian punk rock and rap. Dustin and I went together, going out to dinner first at Panda Express. The event included a skate board contest, and was a great alternative to a traditional Halloween night.

Posted by David at 11:11 PM

Reality Check

I went out for a ride this afternoon on my road bicyle. It was in the upper fifties, so as far as temperature goes, it was almost perfect. I had an opportunity to go on a mountain bike ride this morning, but passed because I didn't get a confirmation back in time from those going. Well, that was my excuse. Really I should have showed up anyway, but I was thinking it was going to be really cold and I wasn't sure I could hack it. Five years in the tropics of Ecuador hasn't helped me at all with my ability to deal with cold. Won't be long now before riding outdoors will be a bit more difficult, what with temps dropping, and rain making the trails muddy, and Standard time bringing us darkness late in the afternoon. All that said, I enjoyed my ride over to our new house and back. A pleasant way to spend an hour any day of the year. Good roads, flat roads, cool temp, not too windy. I was excited to see that two guys were hard at work putting shingles on the roof. I was so glad to see that. I knew they had stacked shingles on the roof yesterday, but I could only hope they'd actually work on Saturday. They won't be able to finish until Monday, but that should work out fine. There has been a chance of rain today, but that's supposed to be clearing up tomorrow and into next week. We've had insulation and sheetrock in the house for over two weeks, and no proper roof. Then we ended up having rain showers over the past several days, which wasn't a good thing. The roofing contractors here are maxed out, because there is so much new construction going on.

As I arrived back home and hung up my bicycle, I was lamenting the fact that my bicycle is getting close to twenty years old and that my riding shoes are wearing out. Due to current financial priorities, those are things I can't replace right now. But, when it comes right down to it, I had to realize that I have quite a lot that I am really thankful for. It's not how low-tech my bicycle is, it's how I'm blessed with good health. It's not that I gave up that great paying job at the county office of education five years ago, and those side jobs at Fresno Pacific University, it's that I have a roof over my head, a comfortable bed, and food on the table three times a day. I think of the people in Sumatra still without a proper house, and a reliable source of drinking water, or the people in Pakistan who are facing winter in tents without sufficient food. I am blessed. Why me?

Posted by David at 04:09 PM

Rain Showers

Well, I'm totally disappointed. I'm trying to get over it though, and not obsess about it. I'm telling myself it's not my problem. The roofing shingles are still not on the new house in Boise, and we're getting rain showers. Nothing super heavy, but I can guarantee you some of the rain is getting through the tar paper and the wood sheeting, especially around the vents. The problem here is that the sheetrock and insulation are already in the house. In fact, they've been painting the interior all week. Oh well, at least it's not pouring buckets like I'm used to in Ecuador.

Posted by David at 10:39 AM

House on Fireglow Avenue

Our new house got some paint today. I can't wait for them to get the roof on. Thankfully this is the high desert, and it doesn't rain much here. But with the sheetrock and insulation in, I don't want to see any rain at all. We have a buyer for our house in California, and the sale is in escrow now. We are supposed to close on the house here on November 30, so we are praying for a fast escrow on the California house sale. Meanwhile we continue to drive the boys back and forth to school, and we are all anxious for this routine to end. We're spending a total of three and a half hours and driving forty miles each day. What is making it so bad is that the boys' have school start and end times that are an hour different. That means we have some waiting with Taylor in the morning and Dustin in the afternoon.

Posted by David at 10:45 PM

Fire Call

For a couple week Dustin has been telling us that his friend was going to have a bonfire at her house and that we'd all be invited. That sounded like fun, and we said we'd go. Yesterday we found out that it would be Saturday night at 7 PM. He said that they would light the bonfire at 6 PM, which sounded a bit early to me, but I thought it's not to hard to keep a fire going, so we won't miss anything. We arrived to see that the fire had just been lit, and that the bonfire was a pile of tree branches, with some brown leaves on some. Before long, the flames were over ten feet tall, and there was a plume of grey smoke high in the sky! It was huge. This was in the middle of a large field, with a hose right there, so I wasn't too concerned.

Somebody else was though, and before long there were about three fire trucks in front of the house, and about eight firemen standing in the driveway, checking it all out. The family had a burn permit, but they were supposed to be burning before sunset, and they were a little late. I think too that the fire was a little larger than it should have been. Well, they didn't get a fine, and were told to hose it down a little bit, to get it smaller. We did, and it was dying down quickly anyway. Later, when it wasn't too hot anymore to stand in front of it, we made some smores and enjoyed hanging out and talking by the fire in the cool fall air.

Posted by David at 05:59 PM

Carving Pumpkins

Taylor and Dustin each got a pumpkin the other day. Even though it's not quite time to carve a pumpkin, Taylor couldn't wait. It probably won't last 'til the end of the month, but that's OK. He hasn't carved a pumpkin for a long, long time, and he can always carve another one if he wants. In Ecuador we could ignore Halloween, and there was nothing there to remind us. We hardly noticed it for the past five years, and that was just fine with us.

Posted by David at 10:50 PM

Dreaming Of Home

I didn't think it would hit me so soon. Friday I was feeling low, both physically and mentally. Discouraged. Friday night I dreamed I was back in Ecuador, saying hello to friends in Shell. When I woke up Saturday morning I realized I was missing Ecuador, and the my old life there. When I left, I figured I was ready to leave, but I also knew that in about six months I'd probably wish I could go back. For me, living in Ecuador was love/hate, and I knew it wouldn't last forever. The missionary kid part of me loved living in a foreign country. The part of me that is from the US got frustrated sometimes with living in another culture. It's hard to explain, but any third culture kid will know what I mean.

I don't think I'm really ready to go back at this point, and that I am probably feeling this way because of this strange stage we're in right now. We've been working on deputation, or fund raising, since the beginning of August. We are just over two months into it, and our goal is to be done in another two and a half months, at the end of the year. So far we have seen our monthly support increase to 75%, and we have $7,000 out of the $8,000 we need for our one-time amount. That means we are on target, because I figured we'd need to see our monthly support increase 10% a month to reach our goal by the end of the year. Despite that, I was feeling down on Thursday and Friday about our support raising. Not because of our progress so far, but because I was feeling uncertain about how we would raise the rest of the amount. Specifically, we've been letting our friends in California know of the need, and I feel like we're coming to the end of the support that we will receive from that area. That means we probably need to look for the rest of the support from the Boise area, and we are still getting to know people here, so I see it as a slower process.

But really, when it comes right down to it, I can't worry about it, and I have to leave it in God's hands. He will supply all our needs, I'm sure of it. God already knows what He's going to do about it, He just hasn't told us yet.

Posted by David at 07:19 PM

It's Been A While

Well, I guess it's high time I made use of this web log. I've been back from California for about a week now. The weather has cooled off since I left, and we are enjoying the autumn season for the first time in many years. The cool days, colorful leaves, and windy afternoons are welcome changes. Taylor is thinking already that it's cold, but I'm afraid he has no idea what cold really is! Since his last winter was at age four, he's having a hard time remembering just how cold winter will be. He is looking forward to learning to snowboard, and I hope we'll get up to Bogus Basin a couple times this winter. He's only got two more football games this season, and it's not as light or as warm at practice any more. He continues to do well with football, but I'm not sure he'll want to do it again this year. I'm glad he played this year, and it's been a positive learning experience for him.

The boys continue to do very well in school. Both are making excellent grades, and have adjusted well to some very dramatic changes. I'm really looking forward to living in the new house, so we don't have to drive them to school each day. That is taking quite a bit of time and gas money, but we feel it is very well worth it to keep them in the same school all year long.

We continue to attend the Covenant Presbyterian Church in Boise. I'm going to the men's Thursday morning Bible study, and Ellyn is attending a two-year long Bible class on Wednesday evenings. We've had a chance to share with the missions team what we are doing with MAF, and we're hoping before too long that we'll be able to share with the congregation. We getting closer to our support raising goals, and we still need more people to join our team. We're excited about the progress we've seen so far, and we continue asking the Lord to allow us to reach our full support goal by December.

Posted by David at 08:32 PM

Long Haul

I'm back in Idaho. It was a long drive yesterday from Oakhurst to Meridian, and I didn't pull in until 5 AM local time. I was getting pretty tired in Oregon, and pulled over to sleep for a while. How long, I know not, but it helped enough to get me home. Good thing I like to drive, because 730 miles is a long way to go in one day.

I'm not prepared for the weather here. It's not exactly cold yet, but to me it feels like I'm freezing. It didn't break sixty degrees today, and rained last night. I'm going to have to toughen up if I'm going to make it through the winter.

Posted by David at 08:36 PM

Fuel Economy

I drove over a thousand miles in the past two days. Over twelve hours on the road yesterday, and about six today. I'm driving my little '91 Toyota Tercel with 176,000 miles on it. We kept it while in Ecuador, and I'm glad we did. Actually, we sold it to Ellyn's brother for $1 and then he gave it back to us as a gift! He drove it for a while, and kept it in great shape for me. It's burning a bit of oil these days, but apparently it's not burning as much gas--I averaged 43 miles per gallon on the way down here! I tried to drive the speed limit, which meant I kept it between 60 and 70 mph, even when the limit was 75 mph. The limit in Oregon is 55 mph, so in that state I drove the slowest. In Idaho, Oregon, and Nevada, most drivers are going at the speed limit or a little above. In California, most drivers are going anywhere from 10 to 20 mph above the limit. People are not happy with gas prices being so high, but it seems to me that most Californians on the road really don't care. If they did, they'd slow down and get better gas mileage. So, if you're barreling down a California highway in your SUV, and you see a little Tercel in front of you, please don't run me over as you go flying by!

Posted by David at 11:44 PM

School Prayer

Dustin has made several new friends at his school. That doesn't surprise me, as he's never had trouble reaching out to talk to people he doesn't know. He told me a couple days ago that they are all relatively new Christians, and that they had invited him to pray at the flag pole on Wednesday morning at 7 AM. I offered to take him early, but he couldn't bear the thought of getting up that much earlier. I dropped him off at 7:30, and there were still some kids praying at the pole. As I pulled out of the lot, I didn't see him, but he later told me he did pray at the pole with them. It was encouraging to me to see those kids praying, to learn that Dustin had joined them, but most of all, that Dustin is found some fellow Believers at school.

Posted by David at 08:14 AM

Air Show

On Sunday, after going to church and Sunday school, we headed over to the Mountain Home Air Force base to watch the Thunderbirds fly. I had never seen that in person before, and we enjoyed every minute of it. We didn't have enough time to look at all the planes on display, but we did get there in time for the Thunderbirds, and that was what we wanted.

Posted by David at 08:12 AM

Football Player

We have a football player in our house. Taylor has taken up tackle football this fall. He's playing on a team in the Boise Noon Optimist Football program. I had no idea this was something he's interested in, but when he heard about this youth football program, he said he'd like to participate. His team got off to a bit of a rocky start, with their coach first coach resigning. But fortunately a few dads have stepped in and are coaching. The team is a bit small, with only seventeen boys. Twenty-two is a more normal number. Last week was the first game, and it was exciting to watch. The boys did well despite the coaching change, which included play changes. Taylor's team lost, but not by much. We're headed to Emmett tomorrow for the next game.

Posted by David at 09:07 PM

Starting Anew

I've decided to keep on blogging, but to start a new one. The old one is history now, and I'm really glad I have it. But, it's time to start something new, as we're starting all over again here in Idaho. Moving to Idaho isn't quite the same as moving to Ecuador, but for four missionary kids who have spent quite a bit of time living outside the US, this is quite a change.

Ellyn and I both grew up in Papua New Guinea, spending our childhood in the highland community of Ukarumpa. Both our parents are with Wycliffe Bible Translators. Ellyn lived there for eight years, and I was there for thirteen years. It was a great place to grow up, and the country was very peaceful and friendly during the '60s and '70s compared the the near anarchy that is being experienced there now.

When we were making the decision to go to Ecuador in 1999, one of the things I wasn't excited about was the fact that Dustin and Taylor would become missionary kids, or MKs. I'm not sure why that bothered me so much, because I certainly don't regret growing up overseas as an MK, and in fact I'm quite proud of it. However, being an MK has thrown some unexpected twists and struggles into life, and I was hoping the boys wouldn't have to go through those things. Living overseas as a child means you miss out on some of the US culture, and you take in a lot of the culture of your host country. That's a good thing, really, but it does mean that in the end you never totally fit in either place.

So, we've done it, and Dustin and Taylor are MKs. I can tell they are proud of that, and they feel a certain loyalty to Ecuador. They may never go back, but they'll always have a piece of Ecuador in their heart.

Posted by David at 06:00 PM | Comments (0)