Mountains

This morning my bible study encouraged me to write about what inspires me.  Of course, music was at the top of my list.  I'll write another post about that sometime.  But, today, I'm inspired by mountains.  Maybe because I have to drive over them this afternoon by myself.  There's a certain beauty and awe in the mountains, but also a healthy fear, at least for me!

I grew up in the mountains, I saw their beauty every day but I was a selfish child who only thought of them in terms of what fun they could provide me.  I went skiing, sledding and snowmobiling in the mountains and I LOVED them.  As a teenager, I began to think of them as nausea-inducing as I rode in a bus over them for countless sporting events, they really just got in the way of where I was going and what I was doing.  When I went to college, though, that's when a healthy fear of the mountains developed.  Two large, windy, fairly dangerous mountain passes stood between my home town and college.  And I drove a tiny little Honda Civic.  Great gas mileage, a bit scary for an 18-year-old driving a mountain pass.  But I did it, many, many times.  I slowly began to appreciate the mountains' beauty and especially loved when I finally made it home, right on the outskirts of town when "my" mountains came into view.  Ahhh, home.

As an adult, back when I had two small children, I would drive these same mountain passes with them in the backseat to get home for visits.  I would always time things just right so they would (hopefully) sleep over the mountains.  I'd put my favorite worship CD in and sing away while driving the familiar road.  I can't tell you the number of times I was brought to tears on this drive by the beauty I would see and something about praising God while driving through what has to be one of the most beautiful parts of His creation.  I had several of these "mountain top" experiences.  It was a difficult time for me and God always spoke so clearly to me through His creation during this time.

So yes, mountains are an inspiration to me.  There was a time when we had to leave Colorado and moved to Flagstaff, Arizona.  I was not happy about this move, it had been a rough time in my life, my marriage, etc. leading up to this point and I really didn't want to follow my husband.  But I did.  I did not like Flagstaff, something about it never quite "jived" with me.  I never felt like I quite fit in there.  BUT, I realized very quickly that God put me in a place that, although it felt nothing like home, it looked quite a lot like home.  I was living in the mountains, with a mountain right out my kitchen window to look at.  I recognized that, even in my anger and resentment in being there, God was giving me a little personal blessing to get me through.  Soon after we moved there, He also gave me a friend.  The good friend I had been needing for so long.  I didn't know it at the time, but God was preparing me for an even more difficult time in my life.  Now I can look back and see it.  I love it when that happens :-)

Like I mentioned, God was preparing me for a very difficult time in my life.  I won't go into that here, but I want to give you a bit of back info.  My husband's career was based in colleges/universities.  The small town I grew up in did not, nor would it ever have, a college or university.  I knew when I married him that I would never get to live in my home town.  Well, through this rough stuff we went through in Flagstaff, God took us back to my home town.  We expected to be there a couple weeks on the way to something bigger and better and it's now turned into 3 years with no intention to leave anytime in the near future.  It was rough, I'm not gonna lie and I wasn't sure I'd make it through with any sanity left, but God is so gracious.  He knew exactly what I needed and blessed me with it.  I get to live with my family, with my mountains, in a community that I "fit" into.  Maybe it seems dumb to make mountains such a big part of my story, but I love when I can look back and see how God has used His creation to bless me, inspire me, and breathe life into me.  Yep, the mountains inspire me.