I have spent my life, from the age of 10, living overseas from family members. Obviously, at the age of 10 I was with my parents and siblings, but everyone else was overseas. Today it is my husband’s family who is overseas.
Today, we saw Nanny Dot (my mother-in-law) for the first time in TWO years!!! I was unable to be at the gate when she walked through, but I spent time thinking about this….
That moment when you see someone you love dearly walk through those gates.
That moment when the joy you experience is a slice of heaven right here on earth.
That moment of overwhelming emotion.
These emotions remind you that you are alive. Positively alive.
I know other people experience things like this. CS Lewis even wrote this in ‘Surprised by Joy’, but I believe that people who live overseas experience greater swings in emotion than the average person. When you are feeling low don’t forget these moments!
I’ve had kind of a ‘low’ week- a heavy, culture shock/loneliness is setting in week. So somehow other people’s joy- an email from a friend experiencing breakthrough in family relationships, a photo of a cousin about to bust in her final weeks of pregnancy, and facebook statuses about someone’s mother-in-law arriving make me sooo happy, and I’m afraid, silly as it is, bring tears to my eyes. -Relating your joy to the whole living-overseas-thing was helpful to me tonight. Feeling not so alone. Timely blog- thanks! 🙂
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