Month 8: What I Miss The Most

I miss weddings and engagements. 
Birthday parties and baby announcements.  
Monday night Bible study and Tuesday night backyard bonfires.  
Sunset picnics and sunrise hikes.  
The predictability of my days, my work, and my routines.  
Showing up at 6:30 a.m. to a dark and silent coffee shop, getting to open it and be the first bright spot in somebody’s day. 
Debriefing every day with my roomies and best friends.  
Saturday sales at ARC and Sunday night french fries after church. 

I miss the mountains and the air and the sunsets I get to watch over the lake. 

I miss getting to sit at a cozy coffee shop with my best friends, talking about life and simply sitting in each other’s presence. 

I miss the quick 9-hr drive to get a hug from family or celebrate a birthday together. 

I miss the insignificant nights spent laughing with friends that turn into some of the sweetest memories. 

But the thing I miss the most, that I’ve learned you give up to the greatest degree on the World Race is this: having choices.

At home, I get to pick which sweatshirt or hoodie I wear from a selection of 5. Out here, I have one. It’s blue. I wear it all the time. 

At home, I get to pick which pair of jeans I want to wear–light wash or dark, fitted or loose, maybe black or with holes in the knees. Out here, I have one gray pair. I wear them all the time. 

At home, I get to pick which shoes I want to wear, from a jumbled, probably too large pile on my closet floor. Out here, I consider–what am I doing today? Will my feet get dirty? Will my feet be cold? Lately, I end up every day wearing my one pair of boots. 

At home, I get 100 options for what coffee I want to drink each day. Deciding whether I’m making it at home or buying it out, and if I go out–I get to choose an americano or a latte or a cappuccino and I have about 100 different flavor options or maybe I’ll just get a house drip, to which I pick light or dark roast, origin, blend, on and on. Out here, I get one choice of coffee each day: instant, black. End of story. 

At home, I can go to the grocery store or a restaurant or a friend’s house or my own pantry and eat just about anything my heart desires. Out here, I get one choice for dinner, because it’s what we bought the groceries for at the beginning of the week. The menu rarely changes, and I’m becoming a pro at cooking rice and veggies for 6. 

At home, if I get a little stir crazy, I can hop in my car and go to a park or on a drive or find a quick hike or running trail. Out here, my “adventures” look like walking 30 minutes down the dirt road, passed flocks of sheep and their shepherds, before turning around and walking 30 minutes back. No town nearby to drive myself to and explore, no coffee shop down the street to spend a Saturday afternoon in, no park to walk around or soak in the sun. 

At home, I get to choose to go to church, and I get to choose which church I go to. Out here, I focus intently when we’re in Spanish-speaking church, trying to understand even just half of the sermon or scripture. And I resort to podcasts and sermon recordings to get even a little preaching and teaching in my native language.

At home, I go to work at a job that I chose to accept. I got to choose how I spent my days and invested my time and energy. Out here, I do as I’m told, and pray to see the Kingdom impact of monotonous manual labor or seemingly futile cross-cultural effort. 

At home, I choose who I spend my time with, which relationships I invest in and who I pursue week-to-week. Out here, I have a team of 6–they are my people, my roommates, my dinner dates, my coworkers, my problem solving partners, my friends, my brothers and my sisters. They are the ones I pursue, they are gifts to me in this season. 

I could go on, and on, and on. 

But to wrap it up, what I miss the most some days is having options, choices, variety, whatever you want to call it. Being able to wear different clothes for 7 straight days, or eat something different this week than I did last week. Being able to add some spice to life and choose my own adventure. 

And I don’t say any of that to complain or whine, or say that life out here is bad. Life out here is simple, and inarguably worlds different than life back home. But that does not make it bad–only different, and different does not equal bad, it simply equals different. 

Please pray: 

• for my team and our ministry. We have just a couple more weeks here. Pray that we would be faithful and our effort would be fruitful, either now or in the future. 
• for an upcoming squad debrief! That every detail, from where we stay to who drives the bus to get us there would be soaked in the goodness of God. That it would be restful and the squad would grow individually and together. 
• for our big transition at the end of the month: we’re changing teams and continents! We will be spending the last 3 months of the year in Southern Africa, pray for peace and mercy as we travel there and settle in. 

And one last thing: While all our major expenses of transportation and lodging are covered through what we fundraise, I still have personal expenses like travel in our off-time, personal care items, snacks or meals out of the house, recurring expenses from home (think car insurance, phone bill, monthly giving, etc.), as well as the occasional adventure/tourist attraction, and some upcoming larger expenses like my flight home at the end of the year (!!!!) and a big adventure opportunity to go to Machu Picchu before we leave Peru!! If you’re interested in financially supporting me personally as the year comes to a close, I would be so appreciative! My Venmo is @emilyjriggs or if you’re more of a PayPal person, send me a message on Facebook/Instagram/WhatsApp and I can give you my email. 

As always, thanks so much for reading and following along, friend! It’s an unexpected joy to be able to write and share what I’m learning and experiencing. I appreciate you more than you’ll ever know.