The Crisp

Yesterday I made a batch of apple crisp.  I decided to put some blueberries in too because it is spring.  My crisp recipe comes from my dear friend Gwen, and whenever I make it I think of her and the memories that surround this dessert.

The first time I ate Gwen's crisp, I was a sophomore in college.  I had just moved back home to Charlotte, NC after a hard and disappointing freshman year at The College of Charleston.  I'd decided to take classes at UNC-Charlotte until I could figure out what else to do.  My good friend Molly had also moved home to Charlotte and was taking classes at UNCC, and she said she knew another girl, Gwen, who was in the same situation.  Molly and Gwen were gonna get an apartment up by campus, and they asked me to room with them.  I said, "Heck Yes!"  Thanks to these girls, I ended up staying at UNCC until graduation.

Moll.  Gwen.  Me.

I don't think that Molly, Gwen, or I would say that we had "the ultimate college experience."  UNCC just wasn't that kind of school.  But those two years that I lived with them were filled with some of my fondest memories of college.  During our time together, we formed and grew friendships with one another that I still cherish today. 


Gwen is a domestic diva.  She makes enormous batches of homemade apple sauce and stores it in jars for the winter.  She uses cloth diapers and looks good without make up on.  And, she makes the best apple crisp I've ever had. When I make the crisp, I think of Moll and Gwen, I think of the batches that Gwen would whip up for us in college, and I think about us sitting around our tiny round table eating it right out of the casserole dish spoonful by massive spoonful. 

roommates.  care-free and twenty.  

oh, if only we knew then what we know now.

Moll, Gwen and I are "grown ups" now.  We usually don't get to make crisp for each other any more.  We make it for our husbands and children and friends in the different parts of the country where we now reside.  But even though I eat my crisp with different people, I will always think of these girls as I peel my apples, slice out their seedy cores, chop them into bite-size chunks, and smother them with a crispy, buttery topping.  

So here's to the legendary crisp and the wonderful memories that it provokes.  

THE CRISP.

Here's the recipe:

1 cup oatmeal

1/3 cup flour

1/2 cup brown sugar

1/4 cup butter, melted

1 tsp cinnamon

Makes crisp topping for 8 by 8 dish.  Triple recipe for 9 by 12 dish.  Spread topping evenly over peeled, cored, sliced apples, or other fruit of choice.  Bake at 350 degrees F until apples are tender and topping is golden and CRISPY!


Are there certain recipes you make that remind you of certain people or memories?  Please share!

Trial Run

Monday morning.  Weekend is over.  Back to the daily grind.

I guess I should do some laundry today.

My good friend Jami dropped her lil' guy Cole off at 7 a.m. this morning.  Jami lives just down the road and her hubby is in the Air Force too.  It's been a huge blessing to have them as neighbors.  Cole and Lucy are only 12 days apart and they are good buddies.  Cole is hangin' with us today, which = 
Me VS. FOUR kids (including the furry one).  

Three girls and one boy.  

This is good practice for when Warren comes home! 

Cole is awesome.  He's such a little stud.  

And he loves our CD cabinet.

While Cole peruses our CD collection, 

our poor, neglected dog Texanna gives me the eye.

Tex: You're not gonna walk me today are you woman?

Me: No, probably not, Tex.  Sorry.  Again.

Four year old sass-factor.

Miraculously, I managed to get the three human children fed, dressed, and loaded into the car so we could take Tess to school. I love this picture, because someday, our Ren boy will be sitting where Cole is.  I also love this photo because all three children are sucking their favorite fingers, which is a sweet sight, and also means that the car is quiet.  And finally, I love this photo because looking at it feels like I won a trophy.  Getting everyone ready and loaded into the car feels like a massive accomplishment that's worthy of a prize.

After we dropped Tess off, Cole, Lucy and I headed to the grocery store.  I never thought I'd have to use one of these carts before, but never say never.  Life never turns out the way you think it will.  I used to feel sorry for moms who had to use these carts in the grocery store, and now I'm turning into one of them.  Hmmm...funny how this grocery cart is pointing towards the wine section.

Buddies.

Today I'm thankful for good neighbors, friends, and sweet Cole, who is giving me trial runs before we bring our own boy home.  I'm thankful for heinously large shopping carts that allow me to restrain more than one child in a grocery store.  I'm thankful that life never happens the way you think it will, that God is full of surprises.  And, of course, I'm thankful for nap time and teatime.

Gotta go do some laundry now.

Facebook Fast

I gave up Facebook for Lent. I suppose most of you know this because most of you who read my blog are also friends with me on Facebook.  Anyways, here are a few reflections on this experience so far...

I haven't observed Lent in a long time.  The last time I can remember observing Lent was when I lived in England, around age 12, and I gave up white bread. This might sound a bit silly, but our village, East Horsley, had a tiny grocery story called Cullens, and Cullens made incredible baguette that my mom served with most meals. Sacrificing baguette and eating yucky whole wheat bread instead was a challenge for me. I had recently become a Christian at that point and I don't remember if I understood why I was giving something up or what the significance of it was at the time.  


Now I'm 30 and I think I better understand the significance of it. Lent is a time for followers of Jesus to really connect with Him as we prepare our hearts for His crucifixion and resurrection.  One way we connect with Him is to deny ourselves in some way for forty days, just as Christ fasted in the wilderness for forty days before He started His public ministry. Typically, self-denial exposes an area of neediness in our souls, and neediness is usually what gets us in touch with God. Lent is a time of reflection, thanksgiving, confession, and communication with God.

So, I decided to give up Facebook this year for a few reasons: 

1) I had wondered if I'd become addicted to Facebook and I wanted to break the habit. 

2) I never feel great about myself after spending a lot of time on Facebook. 

3) I waste a lot of time on Facebook and wondered how things in my life might start shifting if I intentionally spent that time with God instead. 

4) I wondered if my social life was actually suffering because of the amount of time I give to social media and not to another human being in the flesh.  I thought I could be more intentional about pursuing other people in more meaningful ways...hand-written letters, phone calls, even email for goodness sake.  And for my friends in town, I thought I could try to invite them into more of my daily life.  

5) Why do I need to advertise my life to that many people anyway?

[Disclaimer: I actually do not think that Facebook is inherently evil.  It serves a purpose and can be a great way to keep up with close friends and family members who live far away. However, for me--a stay-at-home-mom who doesn't get out much and transient military wife who doesn't have many local friends--it can easily escalate from fun, light-hearted social outlet to scary, reclusive, time-sucking addiction.]

So, looking at my calendar, we are about two weeks into Lent.  

The first week was hard.  I was very aware of my mindless compulsion to check Facebook.  I don't have an iPhone anymore--I drowned two of them in a row--the first in apple juice and the second in the toilet--so it's no longer a temptation to check FB on my phone because my new phone doesn't have that capability, thank God.  But at home, my computer sits in grand-central station in the middle of the kitchen/family room, and I used to find myself drifting over and checking Facebook just to tap out of life for a few minutes.  Once I couldn't do that anymore, I started to feel lost and forlorn.  It felt like the sky was falling because I wasn't up to speed on status updates.  Surely, something HUGE was going on simply because I didn't get to know about it.  My mind kept reeling, wondering what was happening, what I was missing out on.  I felt small and pathetic. I missed a few of my friend's birthdays. I felt like life as I'd known it had come to a screeching halt. It felt painful to stay fully present in the reality of my actual existence without regular five-minute intervals of Facebook fantasy land.

Now it's the end of week two and the withdrawal symptoms have seemed to subside. I'm still wondering what I'm missing out on, but overall, I've finally felt a big rush of calm come over me.  It's been confirmed that I will not, in fact, die if I don't check Facebook. I feel like there's a little less clutter in my head.  There's more space inside of me.  I've also been a lot less tempted to compare myself to other people, which is always a big plus.   

I've heard it said that there's a reason we have two ears and only one mouth. There's a lot of noisy talking, a lot of opinions flying around in our culture today, whether it's via Facebook, blogs, TV, Twitter, etc, etc. The past few weeks I've really wanted to silence some of that noise so I can hear Him and hear myself.  I've also tried to be more intentional about listening to Him instead of just talking to Him. There have been some sweet moments when I've recognized His presence, His whisper, and His pursuit, and it's felt awesome.  

This week has also been hard though.  I feel that space inside of me and sometimes it's just felt plain empty.  I want God to fill it.  I also want and need people to fill it--not electronic people--but real, earthly, fleshly, face-to-face people. And I also know that this side of heaven, it will never be completely full. 

When I drown out some of the noisy distractions in my life, it's harder to deny the gnawing neediness inside of me.  I am aware of it and I don't like it.  But it seems to me that the place where this neediness lives is the same cubicle of my heart where desire lives as well, and when I try to dull my gnawing need with boring distractions, I also dull my desire for more life, more connection, and more of Jesus. 

Whatever people might say, I don't believe intimacy can be found or sustained on the internet. I don't want to sound like a hater, because I love blogging and I believe that the world of social media has brought and can bring about a lot of good in the world. However, I also know that this experience has confirmed to me that there is no substitute for true, human, face-to-face, skin-to-skin connection.  There is no alternative for being able to look someone in the eye, to hear the inflection in their voice when they speak, or see their quirky expressions as they tell a story.  God created us to be sensual beings, and computer screen will always fail to engage our senses. I will never truly know others or be known by them through my blog or Facebook or Twitter or whatever.  

There is less risk on the internet...and less reward.

So I wonder...if this is true...then seriously, what are we doing?  How long can the age of social media truly exist before it all implodes? Do you think your social life is actually suffering because of social media?

Also...

Did you give anything up for Lent?  If so, what is it, and how is it impacting you? 

[btw...you want to hear something really lame?  I'm totally tempted to link this post to Facebook.  Linking it from my blog wouldn't technically be checking it, right?  But I'm not gonna do it...I'm not gonna do it!]

show you love.

At church this morning they played a video of different members of our congregation sharing how the Crazy Love study has impacted them.  The video was set to the song Show You Love by Jars of Clay.  I love this song, but have not heard it in years.  As I heard the lyrics again this morning, they touched something deep inside of me and I started to tear up.  All I could think of was our Ren boy, thousands of miles away, across a vast ocean, somewhere in the massive country of China that knows another language, another culture.  

But love defies language and culture and time and distance.  

God's love exceeds everything.  

And so...we haven't met you yet Warren, but we think about you every day.  We pray for you every day.    

And this is your song.

speak.

say the words that 

no one else will ever say.

love.

love like the world 

we know is over in a day.

i'm gonna show you love

in every language.

i'm gonna speak with words 

that need no form.

i'm gonna give you 

what you've never had before.

you're beautiful

and I am weakened by 

the force of your eyes.

so shine bright

to separate the 

truth from the lies.

i'm gonna show you love.

Tangible

The truth is the word that gets harder and harder to spell.

--Aqualung

As I was reading through “Crazy Love” a few weeks ago, I came across a part where Francis Chan suggests that we go back and read through the gospels like we’ve never read them before--that we erase any preconceived ideas of who Jesus is, of what the church has taught us about Him, and start fresh.  

So I decided to give it a shot.  I’m in Luke now, and so far, I’ve been struck by who Jesus is and was, and by how disturbing the truth He spoke really is when I stop to think about the implications it has for my life.

One thing that stands out is how Jesus is constantly telling people to follow Him, and telling them that they will have to give up everything to do so.  They will have to give up living life for themselves.  It may cost them their relationships with their family. It may cost them their homes.  It may cost them their lives.  It means they will have to become servants, to become the lowliest people on earth.  It’s all about feeding people, caring for people, serving people, healing people.  

There is no “half-way” in His message. It’s all or nothing.  Either you’re in or you’re out. No middle ground, no gray area. Sometimes His words can even come across as offensive because He wasn't aiming to please people, only God. And most of it boils down to this: if you love Him, you’ll obey Him.

I don’t know about you, but I find this truth kind of hard to swallow, mainly because I’ve lived a decent chunk of my Christian life thinking that I can have one foot in and one foot out.  I can be a Christian and still live for myself.  But it doesn’t work that way.  

Truth is a funny thing.  I’ve often wanted to see truth as this pleasant, neatly wrapped package, that once received and believed, will set me free.  But finding truth is sometimes painful--it requires exposure.  It illuminates the lie that I have control, that I can get what I want out of this life, that life is about finding my own personal satisfaction, and that I can provide for myself.  Truth destroys the house of cards that I build.  Sometimes it keeps me awake at night.  It obliterations my false pretensions.  It exposes my constant need for God.  And when these lies are deconstructed, it is freeing and joyous indeed, but it can also be painful.  Just knowing the truth isn’t enough.  Truth is useless unless I allow it to change me, to change the way I live.  

This past week I was thinking about my own relationship with God, wondering about places in my past where I felt He was distant or absent.  I’ve thought about my faith, and I’ve been thinking about how much my faith in God has just been in my head.  I lived out my faith in my head and my heart, but not necessarily in real, tangible ways.  I’ve gone to Bible studies, read Christian books, learned more and more knowledge about God, philosophized and theologized, but it seemed to stop there.  It didn’t always impact how I lived.  Recently, I’ve been wondering if maybe God hasn’t shown up in tangible ways in my life because I didn’t trust Him or obey Him in tangible ways...I didn’t really need Him in tangible ways.

Last October I came across this blog post.  Reading this was part of a series of events that God used to wake Chris and I up to the call He had for our lives.  Part of this post has been ringing in my head for the past few weeks because it resonates with some of the thoughts I’ve been having lately.  Heather writes,

“Truth seekers.  Are we seeking the truth?  Yes, the truth can be found in thick, old, theology books.  It can be found in the Bible.  But truth is also found in a smelly, dirt-floor orphanage in a third world country.  Finding truth in the Bible and in world-famous theology books is a lot easier to find, I think.  I've been guilty of only seeking after the truth that is convenient to find.  Truth that is fun to argue with all my smart friends over coffee.

The kind of truth I found this week is so troubling, I hardly want to talk about it.  And yet, I believe we are to be people who rejoice in the truth...who look for it and deal with it, who expect goodness and grace to radiate and Jesus to be found and glorified even in the darkest of situations.” 

  

I said in an earlier post that this adoption process is like a microscope, shedding light and magnification upon things that aren't always been visible to the naked eye.  The exposure has been profound, reaching the deepest places in my heart, places that I didn’t even know where inaccessible until recently.  The illumination is terrifying, enlivening, anxiety-provoking, and humbling.

The exposure has me thinking a lot about God, about my relationship with Him, and about the way He’s pursuing more of my heart and asking me to trust Him in ways I never have.  I’ve been thinking a lot about truth and faith, and how the two go hand in hand.  And as I do all of this thinking and pondering, one word I keep coming up with is tangible.

I’m realizing that following Jesus isn’t just about studying His word and praying.  It’s also about listening to what He says and actually doing it.  

I know the truth.  It’s the application part that’s sometimes a struggle, because I’m finding that applying the truth to my life and allowing it to change the way that I live requires me to be intentional.  Opportunities to serve the needy don’t just fall out of the sky...at least, not in America, for the most part.  We have to seek them out, and it almost always requires that we get out of our comfort zone.    

I don’t want to just know the truth in my head.  I want to live it.  I don’t just want to know Him.  I want to KNOW Him.  And I guess I’m learning that the only way to KNOW Him is to put His words into action.  Following Him brings with it a profound knowledge of who He is, how He works, and what He’s all about.  I can’t have true intimacy with Christ unless I actually do what He says.

Last night our growth group had our last session on “Crazy Love.”  Next week we are going to have dinner together and discuss how this study has impacted us, and how we want to live our lives differently as a result of it.  I’m excited to hear what we all share, and how we can work together to make these changes a reality in our lives...to put thought into action.

A few weeks ago, we were visiting our dear friends Mark and Tracy at their new home in Michigan.  Over a dinner discussion one night, Mark showed us this Francis Chan video because it was in-line with a lot of stuff we were talking about.  I’ll post it below.  It’s pretty awesome and really sums up some of what I’ve been pondering.

Home

"There's no place like home."

--Dorothy

We got home around midnight last night.  As I walked through the front door, I immediately felt my body start to decompress. We are so thankful to be here. Going away and then coming back gives me a fresh perspective on our life here, a renewed sense of what I'm thankful for, a deepened sense of gratitude over all that God has blessed us with in our home.  Sometimes it takes a change of scenery to give one a new pair of eyes.  

While we were away, the trees bloomed.  Their branches are now full of little, fresh spring leaves.  The cherry blossoms are in full bloom and our backyard is bordered with their cheerful, fluffy, white blossoms.  It's cool and overcast here.  The hills are so green they are fluorescent.  Spring is here...it sprung while we were away.

This morning I've been aware of all the simple things that I'm grateful for about our home...  


Making coffee and tea in my kitchen.  


Being able to put Lucy in her highchair to eat! (Not having to feed her on a plane, in a car, or on my lap!)  


Being able to put the girls down in their own separate bedrooms so they don't wake each other up (though that will end when Ren gets here;)!!!). 


Sleeping in my own bed.


My desk. 


Smelling Texanna's ears and stroking her graying chin. 


The predictability and stability of routine. 


Not having to wake the girls up in the middle of the night to catch a flight or leave our home. (It's 11:15am and Lucy is still sleeping...she is worn out!) 


Standing at the kitchen sink and looking out at the northwestern hills in the distance.


Reliable internet access.


Eating foods other than PB&J and hotdogs!


Looking through the mail and seeing that my renewed passport and several key documents for our dossier came while we were away (plus, our home study is finished!)


Going grocery shopping and not spending $8 on a box of cereal! (People say California is expensive, but it ain't got nothing on Hawaii!)




What aspects of home do you appreciate and enjoy?

Island Fever

[I wrote this yesterday...we are getting ready to leave for the airport now and I've never been so excited to get on a commercial plane in my entire life!!!]

We've been in Hawaii for about ten days now, and here I am, sitting back in our room at the Navy Lodge at Pearl Harbor while the girls are sleeping.  We spent the past week in Maui, and on Sunday we returned to Oahu to try and catch a military hop back to Travis AFB.  

Just about 15 minutes ago, Chris booked us one-way tickets to Sacramento on Hawaiian Airlines. It seems that our streak of luck flying space-available has run out, as there are not any flights to Travis in the next 24 hours.  We woke the girls up around 11:30pm last night and loaded them in the car.  It felt like deja vu from the other night, when we were evacuated from our room in the middle of the night because of the tsunami (aka "salami" according to Tess) warning. We schlepped our luggage to the Hickam Passenger Terminal, hoping to hop on a KC-10 red-eye back to Travis.  Just as we were checking in, the "mission" changed and our plane was suddenly going to Oklahoma instead. We shrugged our shoulders and headed back to our hotel room, anticipating that we'd get on C-5 this evening destined for Travis, which had 50 seats available. But no such luck. When we woke up this morning, the flight no longer existed on the schedule.

And so it goes flying space-a. Ironically, our commercial flight home tomorrow goes through Maui. So we flew into Oahu, then to Maui, back to Oahu, and now back to Maui en route to Sacramento.  I'm starting to lose track of all the coming and going.

The past 24 hours have felt a bit like purgatory...waiting around, trying to get home, not knowing when we'd leave or how long it would take to get there. Waiting is never any fun, but it's a lot harder when you find yourself waiting on plans that are up in the air and likely to change at the drop of a hat. Flying space-a is a lot like being on active duty in the military...once you get on board, you're at the mercy of the mission...you surrender control.    And that is a lot harder to do when you travel with two little ones.  

It's strange to be so ready to leave paradise, but I am. My heart longs for the comfort and predictability of home, both for my sake and the wellbeing of our girls. My skin is tired from the salt, sand, and sun, and I feel like I'm quickly slipping into Jack Johnson psychosis. We are sufficiently exhausted, and while this holiday doesn't rank highly in the "relaxing" category, it certainly has been an exciting adventure and I am grateful for the experience.

We continue to follow the news on Japan, and I'm struck by how strange it feels to be here in Hawaii while all of this has happened.  There is a massive Japanese population here in Hawaii, both of immigrants and of tourists.  I wonder what they are feeling as they watch this tragedy transpire from afar. 

Just last week we went to Pearl Harbor to visit the memorial of the USS Arizona. Pearl Harbor is the only time, other than 9/11, that our nation was attacked on US soil. Many lives were lost, and our country retaliated by dropping a nuclear bomb on Hiroshima.  And now, Japan is facing a nuclear meltdown for a very different reason, and instead of being the cause of it, our Navy ships are providing aid to the Japanese in the aftermath of it. 

Despite what transpired during WWII, the US and Japan have become strong allies. As we drove on the bridge over Pearl Harbor en route to our hotel room on the Navy base yesterday, we saw a massive aircraft carrier sitting in the harbor. I had never seen one so close before.  The sheer size and grandeur of it made my jaw drop. There were at least thirty fighter jets sitting on the upper deck. This colossal ship wasn't here a week ago, and I suspect it had been mobilized for the Japanese crises.


Our trip to Hawaii hasn't always felt like "vacation," but it has been quite an adventure.  In these final days it has felt like we've been trapped in the movie "Groundhog Day." We took a risk by coming with small children and by traveling space-a.  And in the end, I guess our experience here confirms that risky living isn't always fun or relaxing, but it sure does make for a great story!  More stories and reflections to come...hopefully to be written from my desk in California ;)

BIG WORLD small me

We've been in Maui for almost a week now and tomorrow we fly back to Oahu to try and catch a hop back to Travis on an Air Force plane from Hickham.  I've started the packing process again and I'm torn between polar emotions of both sadness and readiness to leave this place.  

Traveling always broadens my world view, or perhaps just reminds me of how BIG this world is that we live in.  Traveling here, meeting different people, and witnessing the vast array of cultures that blend together here in Hawaii has me mindful of how small I am in the grand scheme of things, how many people and cultures and languages there are in this world.  So many people, so many ways of doing life, so many world views that are different from my own. Stepping out of my regular routine and surroundings always seems to drive this truth home for me. It's a big, vast world out there, and I am only one small person in it.

And it's not just being here in Hawaii.  I've been glued to the news over the past 36 hours, watching the devastation that's happened in Japan.  Millions of lives there will be forever impacted by this tragedy.  Millions.  

Sometimes when we travel to new places it's easy to focus on the differences that separate us...different skin color, language, culture, customs, and belief systems.  But as I watch the tragedy in Japan on the news, all I can think of is how similar we are. We all need oxygen, water, food, and shelter to survive.  We all need love and nurturing to grow and develop. We all NEED. We all have dreams and longings.  And a catastrophe of this level reminds me of this.  What would it look like if something of this magnitude struck us in the US?  

A few weeks ago I remember driving down interstate 680 in California, watching all of the other cars pass us.  It suddenly struck me that those weren't just cars passing, but cars full of people, people who have their own lives, their own stories, stories that are as complex and intricate as yours and mine. Sometimes it's easier to just look at all the people in the world and assume they aren't this complex, this human.  It's easier to dehumanize people--it makes life a little less painful and complicated when we think of others as different or somehow less significant than ourselves.  I don't know that we intentionally do this--I think it's a way we try to cope with the magnitude of grief in this life.  It's easier to watch people suffer if they aren't like us, right?  

Two nights ago we were woken up by sirens and loud pounding on our front door at around 12am.  We were told to leave our room as quickly as possible and make way for higher ground.  The tsunami waves were due to hit Hawaii in a couple of hours.  We packed up a "survival" bag of food, water, and clothes, unsure of how long we've be without our things, or if we'd ever see them again.  I'll tell the story in more detail later, but as we left our room the other night and joined the hundreds of other people who'd been evacuated, all I could think about is how similar, how fragile, and how human we all are.  

When we are separated from all the things in our lives that we use to define us--our homes, cars, jobs, language, culture, religion, clothing, etc--we see how similar we all are at the core.  I think that when these barriers are broken down--when we see others as not so different from ourselves--our hearts are more likely to be impacted by the magnitude of suffering in the world and we are more likely to be moved into action on others behalf.  

Land of Contrast

[I wrote this yesterday, but just now found access to wireless internet].


I sit here typing quietly while the girls nap in our hotel room at the Navy Lodge in Oahu.  Chris is out surfing and I am enjoying a few moments of solitude in this dim room.  I feel a deep sense of maternal pleasure as I watch my girls sleep after the long and grueling travel day we experienced yesterday. 


Yesterday morning we woke at 5am to get ourselves to the passenger terminal at Travis AFB in time for the 6:55am role call.  We have never traveled space-available before and we were a bit nervous about how it would go.  Thankfully, there were enough spaces for us to get on the first departing flight to Hawaii and we were surprised by how smoothly the check-in process went.  No long lines, no invasive pat-downs in security, no remote economy parking...shoot, the “airport” was practically in our back yard.  It felt exciting as we took a small bus out to the flight line at Travis and walked up the step metal stairs onto the KC-10 aircraft that would take us to Hawaii for free.  Ironically, I never got a chance to step foot on an aircraft during my active duty time as a nurse, and it felt like the adventure that I had originally signed up for when I joined the Air Force over 7 years ago was finally happening.
  

There were only 10 seats available for passengers on the flight, so there were only 6 other people besides us on the flight, not including the crew members.  In addition to us passengers and the crew, our plane also carried over twenty thousand pounds of fuel.  KC-10 airplanes are designed to refuel smaller aircraft in the air during long missions, since these aircraft do not have fuel tanks large enough to sustain them during long flights. 

As we were getting the girls settled in their seats, the Master Sergeant who was part of the crew stood in front of us and announced that this was going to be a long flight.  He said that the flight to Hawaii usually takes about 5-6 hours, but our flight would take about 10 hours.

Wait.  Stop.  Did he say 10 hours?  

Suddenly my excitement dwindled into a deep sense of dread and I thought “What have we just gotten ourselves into?”  Long flights are hard for me.  Long flights with two children under the age of 5 are what I tend to equate with the word hellish.  Suddenly, I was wishing we’d shoveled out the $2,000+ for commercial airfare.  As the plane took flight I felt like I was being held captive.  No way out.  Nowhere to go.

A few hours into the flight the crew asked us if we wanted to go down to the lower cockpit in the back of the plane and watch the refueling process.  Heck yes!  I’ve seen pictures of this taking place in flight, but never witnessed it with my own eyes.

Chris and Tess went down first, as there was only room for two people at a time.  I got to go down when they came back up.  I walked down a steep and narrow set of stairs to get to the tiny cockpit in the caboose of the plane.  A senior airman sat in the middle seat with a massive panel of switches and meters before him.  He seemed nonchalant and smelled like body odor.  I took the seat to his left and put on a thick set of earphones.  Less than one foot in front of me was the glass windshield that separated us from the thousands of feet of distance that separated us from the remote depths of the Pacific Ocean.  

Suddenly, out of nowhere, a small A-10 fighter jet came up behind us, ready to receive its ration of fuel.  A large, solid hose extended out from the rear of the plane like a big penis (for lack of a better analogy) and hooked into a receptor on the nose of the little A-10.  As the two planes hooked together, a small meter on the dashboard ignited with the words “connect.”  Fuel gushed into the little fighter jet, and when it had received its ration, the phallic fuel pump would retract again until the next plane’s turn.

Chris took this photo with his iPhone.

I could see the fighter pilot flying the plane behind us, in his helmet and air-mask, just like in TopGun.  A-10 aircraft, aka warthogs, are tank killers.  I could see the missiles attached to each wing and the machine gun in the front.  They are small, with only enough space for the pilot himself, and have very small fuel tanks.  They are also very slow, which is why it took us almost ten hours to get to Hawaii yesterday.  Our plane was escorting four A-10s, refueling them several times as they made their trek across the Pacific, eventually bound for Japan.  

As I sat in the cockpit, watching all of this go down, I was struck by the contrast of my existence yesterday.  There I was, watching two planes connect in mid air, flying at over two hundred miles an hour at crazy altitudes somewhere over the Pacific, and just hours before, I was sound asleep in my bed in Vacaville.  

Yesterday was a hard and long day.  Lucy slept for only one of the nine hours we were in flight, and at many points I wanted to scream, or worse.  I wondered if we were crazy, signing up for this with our girls along for the ride. But we made it, and it was truly an adventure!  And it seems that is how adventures are...exciting...with a lot of unexpected curves in the road.

This morning we woke up early with the girls and went out for coffee and breakfast.  As we drove around this island, sipping our hot coffee and taking in the sights, I was mindful of the contrast between yesterday and today.  Yesterday...a touch of hell...and today...a touch of paradise.

But so far, that’s how Hawaii seems to me.  A land of contrast.  It is all at once barren and lush, water and fire, with jagged edges and soft sand...so many conflicting things intertwined into a single existence.  


Perhaps that’s what makes it so beautiful.