January 21, 2010 | Mama Smith

our past month

As I was settling down for a quick nap before a pre-house-showing cleaning frenzy, I began thinking back over the past 30 days. Amazed and thankful for the ways Jesus has held on to my heart and sanity through a pretty wild month of upheaval.

Did I ever tell you the story of our Dream Anniversary Getaway from Hell? No, I think that one slipped my mind amidst the flurry of Christmas, family visits and finding out a new baby was cookin’ itself up inside me.

About a month ago, we were at our favorite little inn atop a cozy residential mountain outside of Asheville celebrating Year #6. The best one yet. Only one other couple shared the premises with us for the inn’s closing weekend of the season. I remember lying by the fire with Matthew, with our bellies full of an insanely good meal, telling him this all just seemed too eerily good to be true.

12 hours later, morning of our departure, we woke up to this.

Okay, no big deal. Just a tiny bit of snow. Nothing a Colorado-born-n-bred man can’t manage. Matthew went out to load up our bags, having fun sliding around, enjoying his dearly missed snow. I finished my pile of waffles, warm cup of coffee and favorite book by the fire. All is good. We’ll be home in no time.

A few hours later. I started getting a liiiittle bit nervous. The other couple was finally awake, so we all went out to help salt (with bare hands, ouch) the 70 degree incline of a driveway. Since 2WD cars, both with bald tires, do not mix very well with ice and snow. The other girl and I were still laughing, taking pictures as we salted and generally unconcerned about any real chance of being stuck.

Ha, ha. Happy! Pretty snow! This is fun! Right? RIGHT???

Yet, after both of us trying and failing to get up the side of the mountain to at least arrive at the main road, the mood changed. At one point, Matthew was driving our car while the other couple and I were jumping on the back of our lame 2WD bumper trying to give it some traction. To one side was the straight up mountain, to the other was the straight down drop off. No guard rails, no foot worth of room. Inches. INCHES, people. The guy told me if the car spun out and started sliding down the mountain to jump off and tuck my head in case the car rolled on top of me. Um, excuse me while I puke over here to the side out of PURE HYSTERIA.

Do you SEE that drop off?? And that was after some rain created the sludge. Post-snow-covered-icy mess.

That’s when I knew it was time to panic. But one does not have that luxury in moments like these. Moments later we went into another ditch…

...then all five of us stood around looking at gravely at each other. Would we be stuck here for days before someone was able to come get us? Would our kids at home freak out with their parents MIA the week before Christmas? Was there enough food in the inn for all of us for that week?

God was gracious and stopped the snow for a brief 30 min, bringing rain that mysteriously turned the snow to slush. We quickly salted, shovelled and hauled our big 2WD SUV’s up the driveway. Hurray!

Only to find out the top of the mountain was worse. Boo. Phone calls were made, tire chains were brought up. Tire chains that did not fit. So we were forced to slip and slide down the guardrailess mountain. Spinning out and having too many close calls to mention. Thinking the whole way, “If we just get to they highway, things will be clear. Asheville isn’t supposed to start getting snow til noon.”

Wrong.

Asheville wasn’t supposed to start getting snow til noon, but by noon I-25 was a mess. We almost didn’t make it up the on-ramp. Hours in, we’d only made it a few miles. Tractor trailers had jack-knifed blocking the road. We stared at this bridge for hours (quite pretty, no?) before we decided to turn around and get a hotel.

Only to have our car stuck in the hotel entrance…along with a few others. Within the hour, all the rooms were full. Matthew hiked through the snow to a grocery store down the way and came back with an Ingles feast.

We were all wondering when and if the roads would be cleared. By morning, the news still reported no roads were cleared, everything was a mess…basically, that there was no way out. I felt my stomach drop. I just wanted to be back home with my boys :( The sunrise was at least a much welcomed sight after hours and hours of endless snowfall.

Matthew went to check on the condition of our car. To “by chance” (ha!) find we were stuck at a hotel right next to a fire station. Full of firemen with orders not to help citizens, but to stay on call for emergencies. But these firemen kindly offered to “discreetly” pull our car out of the ditch. After which we decided to take the risk to at least make it onto the highway. We prayed, then M plowed through a pile of snow to the on-ramp. And it was clear! One tiny trail had been blazed on I-25 around all the hundreds of stranded vehicles. We slowly crept along for 30 minutes until the altitude diminished and the snow completely disappeared. We were finally, finally on our way home.

Good thing I was with an Eagle Scout for that harrowing ordeal, who was prepared with a VITAL survival supply…

Pens. You know, for writing a letter of indignation to the SC governor for SDOT’s lack of preparedness. Or for eating…in cases of extreme hunger. Or for stabbing out the eyes of highway looters attempting to get in your stalled out car. Or building a snow shelter.

Being southern girl, I myself was prepared as well with good ol’ Southern Snow “Boots”.

Sock, trash bag, sock, trash bag. No sludgy, cold feet for me.

So that was the week before Christmas.

Week of Christmas, we have a wild, fun time with my family. We find out our home study is almost complete, just waiting on paperwork. We can’t believe within a few weeks, we’ll have our adoption applications and family profiles in the mail.

Week after Christmas, I begin to feel insanely tired and mildly queasy. Umm. Post-Christmas blues?? Then a certain female 28-day occurance doesn’t occur. On a whim, I pulled out a spare one of these shoved in the back of the medicine closet.

Surprise, surprise (as is always the case for us Smiths)!

As overjoyed as we were with our growing family, there was still a sense of sadness that the path we were on was being diverted for a season. Our hearts weren’t just bursting for a bigger family, but specifically for adoption. And as we let that go, knowing there will be a time and a season for that, we were able to embrace the delight and joy of this little life GOD had planned, before we were even a family, to offer to us. Little minismith #3. We had no idea how you would arrive, but we are more than thrilled to meet you come September.

A few weeks later, as the long winter days set in and the boys energy levels exploded, our 950 square foot home began to feel tinier and tinier. We began to wonder if we were crazy to attempt to run a 5 person family in a 2 bedroom, 1 bath home. People do it all the time all over the world, right? So we did something wild and crazy that we’ve rarely done in making decisions like this. We stopped, waited and prayed. Sad, I know. This should be our M.O. And we’ve been praying these past few months that it would be.

He really does lead us. We decided to put our cute little house on the market. The house that has offered us so much healing and has been the resting place to find new joy in each other and in Christ. We love her. But we know it’s time to part ways. And get serious about this family He is putting on our hearts to grow.

So this has been our past month. A month that has been a little crazier than expected. But hasn’t failed to offer us a place to rest in the swirl of changes. Thank you Jesus for keeping us nestled up tightly with you. It’s pretty scary any other way.