Roller Coasters

In about 62 hours the guys will meet Ellie - not that anybody is counting.

The last two mornings I have woken up with this clicking sound in my head - the one you hear when you are on a roller coaster going up.

I hate roller coasters.

When we were first married I tried to like them because Serge loves them.  We would often meet his siblings and their spouses at Busch Gardens or Kings Dominion and everybody (but me) liked riding them.  He would try to talk me into going on different ones by telling me how the hydraulics on this particular model made the ride smooth, not jerky.  (You can hear him, I know)  And about once a year, I would fall for his persuasions.  I didn't like any of them.  I was genuinely happy to be the keeper of the coats and the diet cokes.
Serge says what he likes about a good roller coaster is that they are virtually risk free excitement.  You can pretend like you are doing something exciting and dangerous without it being so.

Maybe this is why faith is easier for him - or so it seems to me.  Life is more or less like a roller coaster.  All of the ups and downs and unforseen bends in the road, the jerks, all of it ending with a sudden stop (I'm getting sick just thinking about it).  As believers in our good and gracious God, we know the end is safe and the track is laid by the Almighty.  It doesn't, however, feel that way.

Last night after we talked to the guys, Maggie said, "you know, when they come back, it's not going to be normal." 
Yeah, I know. 
"It'll be a new normal," I answer, because it seems like the right thing for the mother to say.

I'm always a bit suspicious of people who write only about the good and the up on their blogs or in their books.  It feels fake to me.  I realize it is difficult to be transparent, and even if you want to, so many of life's troubles involve other people and you have to be careful writing about others.  But I want to be honest and say that while I am very excited that we will soon have Ellie joining us, I am also very, very nervous about what this is going to look like in a practical way.  I believe this is the roller coaster we were meant to get on - Serge and I as well as Maggie and James and Julia - but I don't think for a minute that it is going to be without a lot of those places where we feel like we are dangling upside down in a loop wondering why on earth we chose to get on this thing. 

"For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans for welfare and not for evil, to give you a future and a hope."  Jeremiah 29:11 (ESV)