Through the wonders of high speed airline travel and the simple fact that the United States has four time zones in the lower 48 states, today we are waking in South Carolina. We’ll be able to spend the morning with our daughter’s family and still have time in the afternoon to take a two hour drive to Charleston, where we’ll catch a flight to Denver. After a 3 hour layover in Denver, we’ll catch a late flight to Seattle, where we will arrive just before 11 pm. We should make it to our motel by midnight. That will be 3 am in the time zone where we woke up - a long day. I’m glad we decided to get a motel before driving the two hours from SeaTac airport home.

Years ago, I served on a committee that met in Baltimore, Maryland. I lived in South Dakota at the time, which was only 3 time zones to the west, but it still meant that I could attend meetings in the morning and still be home the same day. Of course the price one pays for this is that you have a very short travel window when traveling from West to East. When we came here on this trip, we left Seattle at 8 am and got into Charleston at 7 pm. Our grandson was waiting up at home when we got there two hours later, having stayed up and refused to go to bed until we arrived. That made a late night for him even though we weren’t all that tired because 9 pm here is 6 pm at home.

Of course the time zone and airline factor isn’t anywhere near as dramatic as when they lived in Japan and we would lose an entire day traveling west and arrive home at the same time we left when traveling east. What I do know is that we tend to adjust to the changes in time zones better when we have long days and go to bed tired.

Bigger than the adjustment to different time zones is the adjustment to once again being so far away from our grandson. We only have two children, but they live 3,000 miles from each other. We so thoroughly enjoy our grandchildren that we love being with the west coast grands and the east coast grands. And we really don’t have anything about which to complain. We live in the time of video chats over the computer and can see distant family members regularly. We can afford airline tickets to travel to be with our family. We have a flexible schedule now that we are retired. And, most importantly, our two children get along with each other and so they value getting together.

Still, there is a real sense that I will miss being able to play with our grandson every day, even though I will have access to the other grandchildren, whom I have missed while I have been here. I am eager to see them and hear about what is going on in their lives.

Knowing how I feel, I wonder what it is like for families who are forced by war and economics and other factors to split and travel to distant places without knowing whether or not they will ever get back together. Throughout history, people who have migrated have had to leave family behind. Some of the oldest stories of our bible are about how Abram and Sarai left the land where they grew up, the land of their ancestors and forebears and went to a place following God’s promise. They did not know where they were going for sure. They did not know if they would ever return. And their story has become part of the foundation of our faith. Our spiritual traditions are founded in a story of family extending beyond the space occupied by previous generations.

We raised our children knowing that they were not ours to keep forever. We wanted them to go out into the world and explore. We wanted them to form significant and lasting relationships and form families. When they were little, I don’t think I quite imagined what that would mean. We’ve had almost a decade of our life when our two children weren’t on the same continent. And now they are almost as far apart as they can get on the same continent. But they have wonderful and exciting lives and have formed family and home in places that they have found and learned to love. I am always a bit amazed at how they can adjust to new places, learn to drive in new neighborhoods, find new places to shop, discover new foods to prepare and eat, make new friends and form community.

One of the treats of this visit has been walking around the neighborhood and visiting with neighbors who know and appreciate our daughter and who watch out for our grandson when he rides his bike around the neighborhood. It is not our home. It is not our culture. We are not southerners and our only connection with the military has been our son in law. It is a place, however, where our daughter is at home and where their family is supported. And we are welcomed into this place even though we are very different from so many of the folks around here. We have a standing joke about some of the words we say that are not understood by the locals. We have to pause and remember how they pronounce “pecan” in the south. We say it differently, but we do want to enjoy the nuts and order dishes that feature them in cafes and restaurants. And when we are around true southerners, my name almost has two syllables, “Tay-ed.” Although I think of my self as grandpa and my grandson calls me “Papa,” the staff at this school all call me his granddaddy, which isn’t an unkind way to be known.

So today we shift gears once again. It is time for us to go home even though there is much we will miss. Part of that is that I don’t know at all what time I will post my journal tomorrow. It probably won’t be anywhere near as early as it has been for almost three weeks now.

Grateful for the ability to travel and explore, we are moving onward.