auvergne
1. I’m starting to get really excited about family life. Not that I haven’t always been looking forward to it, but the sense of anticipation is more palpable when things start converging and falling into place. To use an unabashedly androcentric analogy, it’s like a giant assembly kit–the first step is gathering the pieces, and the second assembly of said pieces into the finished product. Getting hired permanently, wedding plans being taken care of, reading about (and knowing firsthand) the virtues of homeschooling through James Dobson’s book, talking last night about supplementing our income with some work-from-home ideas… These are the pieces. It takes effort to assemble it into a workable life, to be sure, but there is a sense of satisfaction derived just from knowing all the pieces are present. God has provided every one. He is always faithful.
2. Diane and I came across this series of articles the other day and have been enjoying them immensely. Granted, the bookending of the dialogue with narrative is a little hackneyed, but the quality of many of the conversations is compelling and chock-full of sound reasoning and propositional truth. I liked this one particularly. The central question lines up well with the main topic for a debate our home group will be attending in a couple of weeks.
3. How do people move to another country? Why don’t we see more people doing it? Can it be as simple as resistance to change? Is it the difficulty of learning another language? Those two things aside, what other points of resistance are there? The money issue is of course always present, but let’s assume a livelihood can be secured. Could it be some preconceived notion about a possible way of life? People have the same needs everywhere. I would venture to speculate that many people operate under the subconscious misconception that food or water or some other necessity will be incredibly difficult to find, or that survival itself will be arduous. But people need these things and business and commerce spring up everywhere. Almost everywhere you go there will be grocers and banks and water and electricity. Diane and I have been talking a lot about Switzerland lately. Even in Lauterbrunnen, a remote little hiking village Aaron and Donald and I stayed two nights at, we found a bakery and a butcher immediately and purchased good food for dinner. There is a “support network” that makes civilization possible no matter where you go. And I’m sure those of you who have traveled even more broadly can attest to this too.
I think that a lot of people don’t leave because going somewhere else is *new* and frightening (just look at the number of people who stay in their home states even if job opportunities elsewhere are better). Also, its hard to be SO far away from family and friends… :(
If only we could make that friggin transporter beam safe for humans already, hello people, what are we giving out nobel prizes for if they haven’t even come up with a proper transporter?!
hahaha
As a fellow Trekkie, you should know that the transporter is probably the bit of technology from the show that it least likely to actually be invented… Besides the fact that it raises all sort of interesting metaphysical questions about the nature of existence (Do we have souls? If so, how would they be transported? What about our mind? And so on).
:)
BUT–agreed about moving. I suppose it just makes the intrepidity of those who make the move (you, for instance) stand out more in contrast.
actually they have already invented a trasnporter that can trasport atoms/molecules… so now I’m just waiting for the people-sized one :)