Good Both Ways

It's always nice to have a vacation where it's good to go and also good to come home, and that's what we've just experienced. Once I recuperate from "today's" travels I'll put up part two of the photos. It just seems to me a little crazy that although it only takes 10 hours to fly all the way from San Francisco to London it took us more than 18 hours to get home from Michigan! Eighteen hours is still amazing when compared to the covered wagon days, which I actually do think about with gratitude every time we fly cross country, but . . .

I can't sleep in a car, an airport, or on a plane, and with my sleep disorder it wasn't worth it to go to bed Monday night since we were getting up at 2:30am to leave. It is now Tuesday evening, and I haven't gotten any appreciable sleep since getting up Sunday morning, so some recovery is definitely in order!

The travels, though long, were uneventful. YEA!! I always feel so good to be home from a trip that involves flying. Although I'm a mathematician and know the stats (i.e. how much safer flying is than driving), I fear flying. Emotion trumps intellect!!

MUCH THANKS to family on both ends for making this possible - Michigan family for putting us up (and putting up with us!) and California family for providing transportation and taking care of things here.

Thanks also to Dale for recommending the book "The Shack." It was so gripping and thought provoking that I couldn't put it down until I finished it; I read the last page as we pulled into our driveway! I haven't really thought through the theology of it (too tired - but not so tired that I didn't find a number of such concepts disturbing), but in fictional form it powerfully addressed such things as how God can be both sovereign and loving even though that can be very hard to reconcile in the face of monstrous suffering and pain that people can experience. It made me think a lot about forgiveness, justice, mercy, judgment, love, vengeance, reconcilation, relationship, trust, God's nature and so much more. I need to read it again soon when I am not so tired! (I must say there were also a couple of characerizations that reminded me strongly enough of characters in other fictional works as to be distracting, but overall I found it a gripping and thought-provoking read.)

PS Tony and Stacey, we got a bit delayed and arrived home at about 6:30pm today. I'm curious as to whether you beat us to the West Coast?