Hello, Friends!
        I'm writing this week from Mississippi, as John and I undertake the third phase of our adventure into the uncharted territory of closing one chapter of life, so as to begin another.    The house we're clearing out is not my childhood home, but my parents lived here for more than thirty years, our children have come of age visiting here, and we've all claimed it as a haven, a  welcoming sanctuary, a good place to be--so we'll miss coming here, and being here.    What we've already been missing, of course, is the home created by my parents' love and hospitality, which isn't about the house at all, but about the life generated, celebrated, and  shared here.  As we continue to pack and sort and clean and clear, we're  drawing ever closer to that final moment of "closure," when the place won't exist for us, anymore, as a touchstone of memory and comfort--and that's sad.  It's also natural, and inevitable, as are so many life  changes that come about with different stages of life.  Children  grow up and leave home, adult lives evolve through vocational and relationship changes and the various consequences of aging--nothing stays the same. 
 While some few of us do get to stay close, literally to our geographical and family roots, most of us move on in one way or another, and thus must relinquish the old, to make room for the new.
          Sometimes there's grief involved, and sometimes that grief persists for a lifetime--a sure sign of love's unique, irrefutable stamp on our souls.  I'm learning all kinds of new lessons about that dimension of experience, and I'm blessed in the learning, though some of it is hard.   What I hope is that all those love lessons my parents bequeathed to me in memory and values are somehow useful to others, in the person I continue to become.
   I hope I'll continue to remember how they lived in this house, and in the world--not perfectly, but generously and well, with an appreciation for life in all its simple joys and deep challenges.  I hope
 I"ll live that way, too, until I'm not alive anymore. What more can we ask of life than that?
          I'll miss touching ground in Mississippi, with morning coffee on my parents' patio, and easy conversation as we take in our southern surroundings.   I'll miss the meals at their table, with plenty of time afterward for visiting.   I'll miss being in a place that is a repository of my family's history, with my folks as the custodians of that legacy.  In some of the boxes being transported here are things that hope to pass along to our kids, and things we hope to enjoy in the present.  Much more significant are the treasures I hold in my heart, and hope to transmit every day, in how I live my life--treasures of gratitude, openness, trust in the essential goodness of people, appreciation for beauty and laughter, commitment to growing in God's love.
      I look forward to our sharing our treasures with each other, and with others this Sunday, and all our days to come.

Shalom,
Sarah+