This is the first post of a journey. A journey into what will likely be Tadian, Mountain Province in the heart of the Phillipines from what I know now. I will be trekking to the other side of the world not as some sort of vacation, but instead I will be on mission from the Episcopal Church and the Diocese of Texas. It will be some time before I ever set foot in that land, but as many journeys do, this one begins in all of the preparation and mindful consideration leading up to the "first step."
As I write to you today from sunny Austin, Texas, I'm sitting in front of an expensive, large computer in a nice, comfortable chair in my air-conditioned office enjoying my lunch hour with a hearty sandwich I asked a coworker to get over my smartphone and a cold, readily-available mug of water I just refilled not even 20 steps away. Not bad. And while not every detail of this day is necessarily identical to any other day, there's nothing here really out of the ordinary - right down to the run-on sentence and another begun with a conjunction.
However, as I allow my mind to wander beyond all of these creature comforts I find so endearing in my own little modern reality, it occurs to me that much of what I am experiencing may not be remotely even an option as I sit down once again to write in this very blog several months from now. That wonderfully human ability to cognize such transformations of a future reality can lead to all sorts of worry, anxiety and fretting about what that experience will be like when that time comes - or on the flip-side - impatience for it all to begin.
As for me, I am calmed by this vision of my future surroundings. The truth is, I have no *real* idea what my life will look like when I finally set foot in that faraway land. I have stories, photos and vague notions, but nothing that lends itself to a true experiential concept of what my journey will look like. Instead of worry and anxiety then, I find myself enjoying even more the surroundings which I'm so thoroughly familiar with. I take greater pleasure in a cold sip of water, a steady supply of Off and sunscreen to protect against Mother Nature's barbs and a newly mindful indulgence of all of the conveniences of a thoroughly modern world. It is not my surroundings which have changed, but my relation to them. My interpretation of my current reality shaded and reinterpreted without ever having even taken one breath of Phillipine air.
I look forward to sharing the rest of my journey with you and all of the wonderful highs and lows it will be sure to bring. Until then, it's onward to a future which is uncertain, but one which I'm faithful will be powerfully transformative.
Eric
