Places In Our Hearts

Tonto National Park Mts

Phoenix Arizona

As I read a blog post my friend Linny wrote today, a flood of memories and emotions came into me.  She and her daughter Ruby were out for their early morning walk when they nearly crashed into two coyotes who were running full speed across the path in front of them. One had teeth bared and was growling as it attacked the second one.  Linny gave praise to God, realizing if they had been just a few seconds faster that morning they could have been directly in their path.  God protected them from harm.

As she described the mountains that surround Phoenix and the hills that are scattered in the midst of most suburbs I immediately thought about Gold Canyon AZ, just east of Mesa.  Joel and I both fell in love with the rugged desert landscape and Superstition Mountain which grabbed my attention whenever we left the home of my sister and her hubby.  One day we were walking on a sidewalk alongside a very busy road and as I looked up I saw a coyote walk right in front of us.  He quickly crossed the road and headed down into a wash as I pointed my finger and tried to get the attention of Joel and my sister Jan. We saw the prints of a bobcat or mountain lion in the fenced backyard of my sister and brother-in-law's house and Joel kept an eye out for them as he biked the area. Desert flowers are beautiful and so were the desert quail that were everywhere.

Gold Canyon, AZ

We fell so in love with Gold Canyon we decided to move there.  We spent months preparing and put our house on the market in August of 2015.  A week later I was diagnosed with breast cancer and my health problems have been ongoing since.  Needless to say we took our house off the market and grieved the loss of our dream and of my health.  We still call Iowa home as the battles continue.

We have always loved the west.  We have traveled to Arizona twice and our trip to Redding CA took us through the west once again.  We could never soak it in enough!  We lived in Albuquerque, Salt Lake City, and two locations in Montana.  We never planned to leave Montana but God led us back to Minnesota and eventually Iowa.  It took a very long time to let go of Montana and then Gold Canyon.  Yet.......we would have been so far from our family.  Even here in Iowa we see them only a couple times during the year.  We know that God's worked all things together for good.............and we are trying to find a sense of contentment and peace with the shift that has come upon our lives.   Making where we live and this season with my health a place where we find comfort and beauty and peace.

It begins with gratitude.  Gratitude for living in an area surrounded by great neighbors.  Gratitude for the medical needs being met in our small Micropolitis.    Grateful for the people we know here, the years of Joel preaching/working in over 24 churches in the surrounding area has opened up opportunities we would not have otherwise.  Gratitude for each day together as we near our 51st year of marriage.  Gratitude for the time we lived in the West, traveled the West.  The West holds a special place in our hearts.  Gratitude for being here in our city as the grass grows, the trees bud, and the birds nest.  Where we live we have ducks nesting in the neighborhood, a robin persistently trying to build a nest on our porch.  Rabbits and racoons are visible and the deer are already eating our lilies!  A different kind of wildlife, but still enjoyable.  (And no worry about scorpions or snakes).

Each of us have places in our hearts that provide peace, comfort, and beauty.  Maybe it is a place from your childhood, or a lake cabin.  Maybe it is a location you had to say good-bye to.  Maybe it is across the sea........OR Maybe it is right where you live today.  Each place we call home has it's own beauty and gratitude helps us see that.  So grateful.