Boredom

There really is an "end" to the internet.  I've seen every good (and bad) movie on Netflix.  I'm tired of ESPN and Sports Center highlights.  I've wandered aimlessly through shopping malls and along mountain trails for long enough.  I am sick and tired of updating my Facebook and Twitter status.  I have absolutely no interest in making another meal for one person.

I am bored out of my freaking mind.

Not that there isn't enough work today.  Trust me, I would work a lot more if there was more to do.  At some point all the work is done and you are left surfing youtube for funny videos about cats or roasts of your favorite actor or upcoming trailers for movies or new songs to learn or....

When you are bored it is easy to get in trouble or to get lazy.  I guess that is why so many people take up hobbies.  I don't have a hobby.  Not that it isn't cool for some people, but stamp or coin collecting, or collecting anything really, just never appealed to me.  Neither does wood work or knitting or fixing up old cars or painting.

I play guitar, piano and write songs for a living, so learning a musical instrument isn't really high up on the list of "new" things to do.

I go to the gym, but I refuse to live at the gym.  (Actually now that I think about it, I wonder if some of those huge guys who do almost live at the gym are as bored as I am and they have chosen the gym as the way to deal with it)

I could take Karate (again) but seriously, I'm 44.  I'd probably break something...important.  Like numerous parts of my body.

Maybe this is when guys my age go through their "mid-life crisis" and buy a sports car and a new wife. I just bought a mini-van and I have a gorgeous wife already.

I already went back to school (which is what my wife labels as my mid life crisis).

I've begun working on becoming an ordained minister within my denomination, a rather monumental task when I compare my tribe with just about every other denomination and church I know.  There are a lot of books to read, a lot of reports to write, exams to prepare for, and conferences to attend.  This takes away some of the "spare" time, but it does not eliminate it.

I know, however, that this boredom is especially noticeable because I am living in Vegas while Jo and the kids are living 3,000 miles away waiting for their green cards so that we can be together again and we've been like this for 10 months now and so inevitably (usually on my days off), I find myself aimless and alone and to be honest I am bored of being bored.

I am bored of writing blog updates about how bored I am.
And yet, this is an honest part of what it is like to live apart for a year.


           

The Airport

I flew back to Vegas from Edmonton for the last time Thursday.  This was my last trip up to see the family before I drive up to pick them up, go to our interview, and then drive back "home" to Vegas.  It was bitter sweet (not really).  The Edmonton airport has become like a third home to me (actually not in a million years).
While I was back in Edmonton this time we received approval from the Immigration Office to submit our applications, paperwork, and supporting documents electronically, so we spent most of this past week scanning document after document and attaching them to emails in the proper order with the proper file names.
We are now finished everything that we can do on our side and so we wait for the Government to tell us when our interviews will be.

As I approached the Immigration officer at the airport for the last time he asked me the usual questions about why I was in Canada and I told him my story, and that is when things got interesting.  I quote our conversation as best as I can remember it.

Officer:  What stage of the process are you guys in?
Me (wanting to sound professional):  We just finished the I-864 and DS-260.
Officer: Have you done the I-130?
Me: A few months ago
Officer:  I just got the I-130 approval for my wife who is also Canadian.  We were hoping we were almost done.
Me:  I wish.  There is still a bunch of stuff to do before the interviews in Montreal.
Officer:  Montreal?
Me:  Only place in Canada that does interviews.
Officer (slamming my passport down on the table and pushing himself back in his chair): &@*!$
Me:  Exactly.
Officer: I can't go to Vancouver or Calgary?
Me: No, the government closed down those consulates ability to do interviews.
Officer: That sucks.

At this point I am suddenly aware that there is a line up of people behind me waiting to go through immigration who are now shuffling their feet and whispering nervously as it appears I am about to be arrested, or at best, am never going to be allowed into the U.S. because it looks like the Immigration officer and I are having an argument about something and IT IS NEVER GOOD TO ARGUE WITH IMMIGRATION OFFICERS.....EVER!!!

Me:  Sorry to be the bearer of bad news.
Officer:  No, actually you've been a big help.  Hope everything goes smooth for you and the family and you are back together soon.  Have a great day.
Me:  Good luck buddy.

We shake hands and I leave.  The Immigration officer calls the next person, who I can tell is longingly looking at the other Immigration officers and wishing to God they had been called by any other officer and the not the guy who just looked like he tore a strip off of me.

As I walked into the waiting area I was keenly aware of how that officer felt.  You keep thinking this process is almost over and then...WHAM!!! something else pops up to slow you down.

So I say this with my fingers and toes crossed:  I think we are almost done the process.  (I just knocked on wood).  I can say with all confidence that we are ready to be done.  We are ready to be a family again.  This separation thing sucks.

Home

I've been a gypsy most of my life.  Born in Boston, missionary kid in Asia, back and forth between Canada and the United States most of my adult life.  The concept of "home" for me is very fluid.  It tends to be wherever I am living at the moment.  When people ask me where I am from I usually answer with my current location, to which they reply "you've lived in Vegas your whole life?"  To which I reply "no" to which they reply "so where are you from?" To which I reply "Vegas" to which they reply...well, I think you get the idea.

Right now I am back in Canada visiting Jo and the kids for what will hopefully be the last time before I am able to actually come back here and pick them up and bring them back to Vegas with me permanently. Every morning as I wake up next to Jo and see her sleeping I am reminded that home is where she is. It isn't a house or a city.  It isn't a country.  My home is where my wife is.

In the same way I am a gypsy on this earth.  My true home is where my God is.  Every time I read His Word, connect with Him in a moment of worship, hear His voice in a lyric or melody, sense His presence as I gaze at the stars at night, I am reminded that where I live right now is just an address, its just a location in a city on a planet far away from my true home.  

I am a gypsy, but someday I will be home.  

I imagine, at times, that God is looking down at all of us on this earth and saying to himself "I can't wait until I can go down there and bring them back home with me."

I know it because I feel the same way about Jo and the kids who I love with all that I am and because I know that Jesus loves us with all that He is too.

Home is where the ones you love and the ones who love you are together.  That is what I want most in this life and the next.

From Painfully Slow to Extremely Fast

That about says it all.
Months and months of nothing.
Wondering if we were ever going to be back together.
Thinking that perhaps the year of living apart might actually turn into 18 months or 2 years.

But then, just when you are about ready to go postal on someone, you get an email and suddenly everything starts happening all at once.

Case numbers have been assigned.  Paperwork is on its way.  We can now sign up to deliver everything electronically, taking weeks off of the process.  I can pay the fees that will get us one step closer to the interview.

Perhaps the most amazing thing in all of this has to do with what Jo and I can only see as a "God thing" and not a coincidence.

Part of the paperwork we can now submit includes criminal background checks from everywhere Jo and the kids have lived.  For Jo, this meant England.  Getting a police background check from England, when you haven't lived there for years, and you now live far away can take weeks, and was the one thing that was going to potentially slow us down the most.

Everyone Jo talked to said it would take a minimum of 3 weeks and could take longer.

Jo got it in two days.  2 Days!!!!

It is already being couriered back to her as I write this.  Once she receives it, she can put it in the file and send it and then we are waiting for interview dates.

All of this makes me stop and think about how I relate to God.  At times, often if I am honest, I think God isn't doing anything because I don't see anything happening.  It is at these times I need to remember that God is always working behind the scenes.  Just because I can't see it with my limited human eyesight, does not mean God is also limited.

This is hard to do.  Especially when life is unfair, when good things happen to bad people or when bad things happen to good people.  At times I wonder if God is working at all.  Then days like this happen and I remember that He is God and I am not.  That I live in a sinful, human world and the consequences of living in this world are not always pretty.  They are not always fair or right.

But the end is coming, and when it comes, it will come fast.  God will set everything right.  He will make everything work together for good for those who love God.

Until that day, I have to do the best I can to remember this.

And then something good happened

So we are in the "final" phase of this Immigration journey (nightmare), whatever that means.  Despite the fact that it has taken over eight months, despite the fact that my daughter's file has mysteriously gotten separated from Jo's file and the boy's files and is weeks ahead of theirs in the process, despite these and a million other small, tiny, details, there is a light at the end of this tunnel.

We still don't know when exactly we will get an interview date, or as of yet, what forms the government will require us to file before that interview date, but, but, but, but, at least we are in the phase where they now ask for all these documents, meaning the end is near (ish).

One of the things the government will ask for are my tax transcripts for the past few years.  The only problem with this is that I have been living out of the country for several years and so have only recently filed all of my back taxes for the years I lived outside the US (don't ask, it is a long story and very convoluted and confusing - which is why I am not going to bother you with all the dark and mysterious details).

I tried to order the transcripts online.  The IRS website locked me out.  I was not happy.
I tried mailing in transcript requests.  They said I would hear from them in ten business days.  I waited. Ten days came and went.  Twenty days.  Nothing.  I was not happy.
The IRS website does not contain a phone number where you can call and ask for transcripts.  You must show up at an IRS office with proper identification.

A trip to the Las Vegas IRS office was in my future.  I was not looking forward to it.  I've been to government offices before.  I took my ipad, my ipod, my phone, a case of water, food for several days, a sleeping bag and a pillow.  I said "Good-bye" to my co-workers and told them I was hoping to be back at work within 3-5 business days.  I took enough money to pay for parking for a week.  I was expecting the usual bureaucratic, red-tape, long lines, and hassle that accompany most government offices.

And then something good happened.

The IRS office was fast, efficient, pleasant, not overcrowded, clean, and a down right enjoyable experience.  The ladies who worked there were friendly, they took care of me, got me all the documents I needed, didn't charge me for anything, and best of all, I was in and out in less than one hour.

One hour people!  At the IRS.  Less than 2 weeks after tax season when everyone should be down there crying and moaning and whining and fighting about their tax returns.  But not today.  Today, the IRS was like a little piece of paradise.  And I'm not even lying.

Now, if I could just get Immigration to take a lesson from them, we'd be done this whole thing tomorrow and Jo and the kids would be down here in no time.

But for today, I will be thankful when something good happens.  Today, something good did.

Thanks Las Vegas IRS office.  You were awesome.

Today is Saturday

My life right now is like a giant Saturday.  Like 'the' giant Saturday.  The one between Good Friday and Easter Sunday.  A day of waiting.

When Jesus died it was the darkest day in the lives of his disciples.  The Bible is very clear that they did not fully understand that He was going to be crucified on Friday and then rise from the dead on Sunday.  When Joseph and the Roman soldiers put Jesus' body in the tomb the disciples thought it was over.  There was only darkness for them.  The disciples were waiting; perhaps for the Roman soldiers and Jewish leaders to come and arrest them; perhaps for a miracle; perhaps for everything to quiet down so they could quietly return to their lives as fishermen and tax collectors.

But on that Saturday as they waited, they didn't know what we know.  They hadn't experienced the Sunday that we look back on and celebrate.  They still had to wait, and they weren't sure exactly what they were waiting for.  They only knew that Sunday was coming, and with it, God-knows-what.

I feel like that as a modern-day disciple.  For me, every day since Jesus rose from the dead and went back to heaven is like another day of waiting.  Waiting for His return.  Waiting for everything that is wrong in the world to be made right.  Waiting for all His promises to come true.  It's just that I've been waiting a long, long, time.

The world has been waiting a long time.  Over 2,000 years.  No wonder so many people have forgotten or no longer care.  Absence, apparently, does not always make the heart grow fonder.

But there are some of us who have not forgotten.  There are some of us, the rebellious, the dreamers, who still wait.  We know He said He would come back again, but we have no idea what that will look like or when that will happen.

Sunday is coming, but it is a long way off and the picture is really blurry.  Perhaps I will die and the next thing I see will be Heaven.  Perhaps one day the rapture will happen and I'll suddenly find myself in a better place; a perfect place.  Perhaps the clouds will suddenly role back and the little cloud will appear and every eye will see Him as He returns on the clouds.  Maybe He will rule this world for 1,000 years of peace.  Maybe He will take the Saints to heaven for 1,000 years of peace will the earth is made new.  I can imagine, but that is all it is right now because the Bible is clear that no eye has seen and no mind has even come close to imagining the beautify and perfection of heaven.

But all of that is Sunday, and today is Saturday.
The hardest day of all.  The day of waiting.
The challenge disciples throughout the ages have faced is no different than the challenge faced by Peter, James, John, and the others on that Saturday so long ago.

Don't give up.
The weekend isn't over yet.
Sunday is coming and you won't believe what He has in store for you.
It will be worth the wait.

 

6 weeks, 42 days, 1008 hours

6 weeks.  42 days.  1008 hours.
This is how long it will be until I see my family again.  As I was sitting on the plane yesterday, flying back to Vegas after spending a short week with Jo and the kids, the thought of 6 weeks away from them again was a little overwhelming.  Remember, we've been doing this for 8 months now, so in the past 8 months, I've spent about 6 total weeks with them.
6 weeks seems like a long time.
So I started thinking in terms of days.  42 days until I see them again.
That doesn't seem quite so bad.  For some reason the thought of days instead of weeks seems less daunting.  One day at a time.
Then I started thinking in terms of hours.  1008 hours until I see them again.  My flight was three hours, I'll sleep for 8 hours, so already I'm down to under 1000 hours.  That was easy.  Well not really, but thinking in terms of hours makes it go so much faster, at least in my head.

Maybe that is why Jesus tells us not to worry about tomorrow.  Don't let the enormity of life get to you. Think in terms of the here and now, of the day you are in, of the hour that you have right now.  Enjoy this hour, live this hour, love this hour, believe this hour.  You are only responsible for this hour.

What will you do with this hour?  I know I've wasted many many hours of my life.  I don't want to waste any more.