Oh y’all.

I had cute intentions of sitting in a hotel room or at my friend’s house and typing up a little overview of our days so far.

Instead, we stopped to see a bevy of friends the first day (stops which were both planned and spontaneous and such a happy mix of it all) that I was too busy driving or hanging out to write anything.  And that evening was too perfect to visit with Beth & Beth from the college days that I didn’t want to spend our limited time looking at the screen and typing words when I could be looking at their faces and speaking words.

(I will eventually share the stories though.)

And Thursday.

Well, Thursday I woke up and puttered to the bathroom at Beth’s house, prepping for the morning.  Without any thought I heard myself singing quietly “Great Is Thy Faithfulness”.  I don’t know why.  I don’t even recall the last time I would’ve heard that hymn.  But there it was anyway and I smiled to myself and thought, “Yes, that’s true.”  Because I was at a friend’s house that I hadn’t seen in two decades and yet we had such a fantastic time and my kids loved her and she generously fed us and Beth’s family (two different Beths – I know) both dinner and breakfast.

There’s lots in between but I’m too tired to fill in the blanks right now.  (Like 600 or more miles in between.)

I’m just jumping right to the almost-end of the story.

The kids and I were just about to ask Kansas to forgive us for all the bad things we’ve said about her.  We were ready to transpose all of our negative Kansas feelings to Missouri, which we decided on this trip was an unpleasant state all around.

Until somehow it was dark and hotels seemed scarce and lightning lit up the sky and the rows of turbines in both a beautiful and eerie fashion and I whispered to London to try to quietly check for any tornado warnings.

I didn’t need to wait for her internet search to complete itself.

Horrendous rain and gusty wind made driving impossible.  The road was suddenly vanishing it felt and the U-Haul in front of me stopped mid-road and I think I was still on the road but the white lines were invisible and all I could do was stop our car too.  Hail was hitting our car so hard that I just sat there, waiting for our windows to break or our car to rise in the air and I started singing the only song in my head – “Great is Thy Faithfulness”.

Piper bravely joined in, eventually all of the kids were singing, although our voices were barely audible over the wind and the rain and the hail beating the roof and the windows.

It was scary enough to pray the sort of prayers that run a little like this: “God, don’t let just me die and leave my kids without a mom.  Don’t take just one kid.  Uh – if we have to die, can we all just die together?”   (Somebody tell me I’m not the only person who has ever prayed like that?)

Obviously, the storm eventually passed.  After checking out the internet later we were absolutely in the little red center of whatever was happening in Kansas.

The nearest town – which wasn’t all that near – had about five hotels and they were ALL completely booked from travelers like ourselves trying to get off the interstate.  We had to drive another hour to find the literal last room in this tiny hotel after midnight.

So, Kansas – we’re not ready to be friends yet.

But, truly, Great is God’s Faithfulness.

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