As time passed, we were blessed with two more children, first Abe, then Arlie less than two years later.  When Abe was a baby, our friends, Troy and Katie, took their family on a year-long trip around the United States.  They are dear friends and wonderful people.   We were sad to see them go, but also inspired and intrigued by their courage to do something so out of the ordinary.  It reminded us of our old dream.   Also, when people we admire do something, we try to learn from them.¹ 

Not long after Troy and Katie’s trip, another couple at church, Kevin and Ginger, moved their family to the mountains of Guatemala for a year to work on a clean water project initiative for the Living Water Project, the Peugeot Center at Lipscomb University, and Otter Creek Church in Brentwood, TN.²

In 2012, more friends, Dawn and Brad, took their family on a six-month long trip to visit many National Parks.³  All of these families are a little ahead of us in life and are all brilliant, wonderful, and generous people who love God.   Their lives are a testimony to that, and they are friends and mentors.  It is a gift to know them and we’ve learned much from them over the years by being in community with them.

Each family’s adventure showed us we could still pursue our dream of living and traveling overseas, but with our kids.  It also showed us it would be okay for Scott to pause his career when the time came, our kids would grow and benefit from the experience like we assumed and we could work out the finances.  

The ten years since have been full with working, homeschooling and raising children.  They have been rich with family, friends and pursuing various interests and endeavors.  Some years have been difficult dealing with various health and personal challenges. We made sure to take couple and family trips most years believing that it is always good to get away from normal work and home life to rest, renew and explore.  We’ve gone camping, to a beach, to theme parks and on road trips.  On a few of them, we went out of the country, usually to Latin America. 

We continued to talk about the possibility of moving overseas from time to time.  Scott’s interest in the idea waned as he progressed in his career.  As a homeschooler, I started imagining what it’d be like to not just move overseas but to go see some of the things we were learning about.  I kept hoping Scott would come to a time when he was willing to step away from work for a season.  I knew we could make it work financially because of our experience paying off our student loans.  

As the years passed and the kids got older, they started voicing opinions about the possibility of living overseas if we brought it up.  They were very vocal about not wanting to move to another place for a year even though they like traveling.  Eventually, two other events happened:  John started high school (outside the house) and then the pandemic hit.  First, John wanted to attend high school for all four years outside of our home.  Second and suddenly, going overseas was no longer an option. 

Now what was I going to do with my old dream? I eventually realized I had to let it go.The year before I came to this realization, I began targeted work on recovering from codependency.⁴  I learned a prayer from a mentor at church.  Laura said this prayer was helpful in her journey:  “Lord, I am powerless to _________, you are powerful, please change me.”  That prayer resonated with me, and I started praying it daily.  I also revisited the serenity prayer –  “God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I had and the wisdom to know the difference.”  

I worked on learning what I could change and realizing what I couldn’t.   I sorted out a lot in my life.  I couldn’t change that Scott wasn’t ready to pause his career, that John really wanted to go to high school at home in the US, that my kids did not want to move overseas, and that the Civid travel restrictions now prevented us from going.  I needed courage to change the things I could change: the way I was handling stress, how I handled things not going my way and consistently taking on more than I could do well.  I needed to focus on being a better person to the people I love the most.  The prayers above helped me address many shortcomings and points of angst in my life.  They also helped me give this dream that I’d held onto for so long to God where it belonged.

While I accepted we might never go away as a family for a school year, I still imagined what we would do if we had the chance.  Sometimes Scott would even humor me and talk about it.  Over time these became the goals of a possible school year “in the field:”

• Visit multiple countries rather than moving to just one – some that were pleasurable to be in and some that were challenging.   
• While traveling, go see some of the history and art we’ve learned and read about.
• Specifically work to improve our Spanish so we can relate better to the Spanish speakers in our church and city.  
• Hopefully do some in-country work for Living Water, the non-profit I mentioned earlier.  (We had been doing fundraising, logistical and administrative work for it for several years.)
• Grow as a family and as individuals

So, that’s what this is, a school year “in the field.”  Could we have done all of this on shorter trips to one place at a time?  I don’t think so, not all together.  With the type of work Scott was doing the past ten years, he never felt free to be gone from the office for more than a work week.  We did the best we could with those trips, but were limited by that constraint.  Our plan is to spend the fall semester in Europe and the Holy Lands and the Spring in Latin and South America, Spain and Africa.  

Our alternative school year did not happen in the timing I would have chosen, but it’s come at the perfect time in many ways.  I’m so grateful for this opportunity and often cannot believe we’re actually doing it.  I’m thankful Scott had the courage to step off the corporate ladder to give our family this experience together.  I am grateful we were able to go while John can go with us and he decided to take a gap year to do it.  I’m thankful COVID severity has passed so we can freely move around to lots of places.  I’m thankful we decided to join the Catholic church last year (now all of these holy sIghts mean so much more than they would have before.)  I’m thankful God connected us with a wonderful Christian counselor, Ken, who’s helped us grow so much as individuals, spouses and parents.  The list could go on.  

There are some difficult things about leaving this year, but this is the year we have, so we’re taking advantage of it. Whatever dream you have unrealized, I hope my story encourages you to give it to God, realize that He is powerful and have courage to change what you can.