A reason for everything, a part of the plan

A very good Sunday morning to you all and as the character Charlotte would have said from E.B. White's Charlotte's Web, "Salutations."  It's so very early in the morning hours here and I am up and on cup of coffee #1 of many to follow for this day.  It will be a long one, a day I have left to finish up everything on the old "to do" list before school starts tomorrow morning.  As I peered into the bathroom mirror a moment ago and caught sight of my very weary and tired face, I'm sure I could have been the inspiration for the phrase "dead tired".  Life made a very dramatic change for me, now 6 days ago when I accepted a position as one of the fourth grade teachers for a wonderful school near here, Olathe Elementary.  I've been on the "run" since that day and although I'm exhausted I couldn't be happier.  So it begins!

As school starts anew, now in about 24 hours, I cannot help to stop and think just what a summer this has been for me.  It may well go down in the "Peggy Renfro history book" as the most memorable summer ever and not because it was all good either.  It's not a government secret or anything that I have been extremely homesick.  Shoot, as I look back over my blog posts from June and July, being lonely for Kansas, my family and friends and the old life I used to have was a very prevalent theme.  I didn't like Colorado and just kept telling people that there needed to be one big fat hole bulldozed between here and my home state of Kansas so I could look back and see through.  My dear husband Mike, whom I dearly love, spent many an evening listening to his new wife telling him that I missed home as  well as generally adding in the phrase, "I want to go back."  But I did not leave.  How many times I imagined a pioneer woman, just like me, whose husband would tire of listening to the incessant whining and simply trade her to the Indians for a new horse or something.  What I am telling you is that he did a whole lot of listening and still loves me.

Aside from the fact that I moved to Montrose to begin a life anew with Mike,  all summer long I have questioned very seriously what in the heck I was doing here.  What was God's purpose in sending me to this place that was well over 600 miles away from my home in Kansas?  Did He have something in mind for me?  What would happen to me?  Would I ever be happy here or satisfied?  I have been full of questions since I arrived here and it was beginning to get the best of me.  And then came last Monday morning.

I'm not even going to try to explain how the opportunity came for me to teach fourth grade this year and perhaps we could just suffice it to say that it could not have arrived at a better time. And as in everything in my 57-year old life, when I finally stopped trying to figure out the reason or the purpose of this all, God made it known to me.  I smile now as I think of Him watching my half-hearted attempts at figuring out what I was supposed to do here and finally after 3 months saying to me, "Hey, Peggy.  If you would just leave this all to me it would be a whole lot quicker and easier for you kid."  

And thus for me, I feel blessed to say that tomorrow begins my 36th year of returning to  a job that I hold near and dear to my heart, that of being an educator.   Never, never in my wildest of dreams did I think it would happen here in this place, south western Colorado.  I've driven through the little town of Olathe a dozen times this summer and not even once did I say, "That's where I'll be teaching some day!"  But at the right time, God's time, it has happened for me.  I know now why I was brought here~it wasn't just some random act in my life's plan that I was transplanted from the flatlands of Kansas to the mountains of Colorado.  Everything that has happened from January of this year until now was a small part my life's plan, drawn out long before I ever even arrived on the face of this earth.  And although I have questioned it  hundreds of times during my 21,116 days of life, I am at peace in my heart that someone who is so many times wiser than I am is in charge of it all.     
Well, it's definitely time to get a move on because this is one day that I cannot afford to trade much "daylight for dark".  The wind is blowing out of the east once more as it comes off of Cerro Summit and my bare feet are a little chilly right now as the early morning breeze comes in out of the kitchen window.  I want you all to know that I am ok and that little by little life has become easier here for me.  Being shown to me what I was supposed to do here has been a blessing to me, a REAL blessing.  Although I will always consider Kansas to be my home, I am happy to finally say that I don't mind living in Colorado and believe me when I say to you, that is a definite change in attitude for the better.  Thanks friends and family for all of the kind and encouraging messages that you have sent to me in the weeks that have passed.  They came when I needed them the most :)  Have a great Sunday all of you.  This is the 18th day of August, 2013~a great day to be alive in and if you think it's good today, then just wait until tomorrow.  It'll be even better.  

 Three men who mean "this world" to me~my husband Mike, my oldest son Ricky, my dear friend LeRoy on the day that Mike and I were married.

My 3 blessings whom I love with all of my heart and miss them so very much.  
                                  Ricky Miller, Grahame and Ursela Hemman

Summer school from 2011~just look at those faces~  Now that's why I am a teacher.