That last step was a dosey!

For anyone who has been paying the slightest bit of attention to this blog, the changes I have made will be apparent. I was recently having a movie night with my daughter. We picked Alice in Wonderland. I won't admit how many times we have watched it. I was really paying more attention to the job search I was doing than the movie until it came near the end. Alice was pacing around the ethereal courtyard. She is fretting about all that is expected of her. She looks and sees Absolum. She brings her question about who she is to him. And he says that she is almost Alice.

In the weeks since that scene caught my attention, I have been doing my own pacing. I am in the process of job hunting. A total career overhaul is a more accurate description. It has been a time of great pressure. I am it. The only one here to pay the bills to keep a roof over my daughter's head. The path I had been proceeding down is no longer viable. I have stepped out the boat. Though some days it feels as though I was pushed. In a lot of ways I have simply rested in God. Doing what I needed to, but not fretting over everything. Like Peter, I called to Jesus and walked on the unsteady, raging water. Then, came one wave too many. I looked over to the storm and began to sink.

In the midst of this time, I had begun reading The Hobbit. There is a part where Bilbo has gotten over the initial excitement of the adventure he didn't want to go on in the first place. "Bother burgling and everything to do with it! I wish I was at home in my nice hole by the fire, with the kettle just beginning to sing!" Then the narrator takes the time to note, "It was not the last time that he wished that!" Ah, what fickle creatures we tend to be. High as a kite at the outset, but wishing to be back in the safe, dry closet with the dust bunnies at the first little rain cloud.

I can identify with Mr. Bilbo Baggins, the would-be burglar. I can identify with Alice. There was something important for me to do. I left my comfort. Then I found myself in a curious place. I went about the things asked of me. But soon I found myself wishing for that comfortable place. I wondered if I could in fact do what was and is being asked of me. In fact, the question I have been wondering for a long time surfaced once again. Am I Fancey? Of course, it is my name. But there is something more. Something to being fully Fancey.

For many years, I have asked the same question that Alice did. Was I the right Fancey? At times, I asked God. Upon reflection, I find that I wasted a lot of time bringing that question to people and things. The thing is that God created me. He is the only one who sees past the exterior. He is the only one who can answer that question. I have gotten an answer. Hence the change in title.

I am almost Fancey. I have regained some of my muchness. Like Bilbo, I have begun to show my worth. I have taken a little walk on the water. I sunk a little but Jesus caught me. My eyes are on him again. There will be temptings to think fondly of the nice things in the place I was. The place I am now is dangerous. As C.S. Lewis describes Aslan, his Jesus figure, "he's not safe. But he's good." He has invited me into an adventure, not a leisurely vacation. However, He is good and ever faithful.

Sojourn

Here is my first attempt at a collage since I was a teenager. I started this as a way to take a break from homework. As I selected the photos, magazine clippings, and passages of scripture, it evolved into something more than just a distraction. I picked a fortune from a Q Mandarin fortune cookie. It reads: The virtue lies in the struggle not in the prize. It became clear that it was a way to process all that had happened in the last few years. I titled it Sojourn. It is not an ending but beginning. It is the a reopening of a door that I allowed to be closed a long time ago. A part of that is to share pieces like this. It is a part of me. Out there for the world to see. My hope is that it does not just reflect me, but what God has done and will continue to do in me.