Good-byes...

Today I hugged my kids good-bye for two weeks.  I really did not expect tears--at least from me....but guess what.  They got in the car with their dad and I started the waterworks.  I have never been away from them for more than a few days at a time and it is gonna be tough.  I have been crying a lot lately over many things and that is just not normally me.  It seems that I have been saying a lot of good-byes lately and that is hard.  Today, it was good-bye to my kids....yesterday it was getting ready to say good-bye to a co-worker that I really enjoy working with....last week it was saying good-bye to a job opportunity that I really felt God was leading me toward.....I don't know why all of these good-byes are coming so close together...but I do know that I am not enjoying it.  I have also had my washer break, my bathtub drain break, rain so I could not mow when needed, etc.  It would be easy to have a big old pitty party--and I'm not gonna lie--I have had a few of those moments....BUT...really compared to the people I am going to help in a few days, these problems are nothing.  They are trivial and they are not permanent.  How many of the parents that I will see have had to say good-bye to their children forever--or at least for this human lifetime--because of diseases that we have medicine for here in the states.  How many people in Brazil or even here in the states don't have co-workers to say good-bye to because they cannot find a job.  I have not one job, but two....that is something to be thankful for.  The people I am going to serve in Brazil don't have washers or bathtubs or even fresh water that is really healthy to drink.  Today, I really needed to mow, but I had several things I needed to do first.  I got home, jumped out of the car and got the yard mowed.  Literally, the minute I pushed the mower back into the garage, it started raining!  And then there wasn't just one rainbow, but there were two of them.  God is good, all the time and I want to be thankful for what he does for me and has done for me and not focus on the things that do not seem to go my way.   There are blessings around us all the time and sometimes I think he breaks us down a little so we can really focus and see them all around us.