September 1 – 8, 2021

September 1 – 8, 2021

When you work on the road, you have little chance of taking home time for granted! I know I’ve been home a lot lately, but I guess the longer I work on the road, the more I appreciate home, so I’m going to try and be here more often. I realize that will make it take longer to reach our goal, but here are my thoughts.

It has to be clear to everyone that we are certainly in The Last Days as described in the Bible. We don’t know what the future holds,, but we know it will be anything but normal! There is nothing I can do to change the rising cost of property, and building supplies. Now that we have reached our original financial goal, but prices have tripled, we have to continue to rely on the Lord’s direction and provisions for our next step. This greatly affects when I can come off the road, and lead a “normal” life. You know, maybe retire and work only about 40 hours a week, in just 5 days a week, home for supper every night, and taking two days off EVERY WEEK! LOL Not sure I have ever done that, without at least one or two part time jobs on the side. Even better, maybe work the 40 hours in just 4 days each week.  LOL I know, dream on!!

So because of all the uncertainty, I want to spend as much time with Annalou and my family as I possibly can! We love to do everything together. We enjoy shopping, cooking, and searching for land. Speaking of land, I followed up on that 8 acre parcel that is land locked by pasture. The present owner of the pasture land is willing to install a gate near our property line, and allow us to open the gate, drive into the pasture, close the gate, drive across the pasture, open the second gate, drive through onto our property, and close the gate each time we need to pass through. That’s it! Imagine us doing that both ways, avoiding all the cow poop, in the rain, at night, and friends doing the same when they come to visit. Imagine a concrete truck doing all that, and driving across the pasture without getting stuck! LOL On top of that, we would still have legal fees to get it all in writing.  THEN we could start to clear land and build. We decided against it!

I worked on my van, did some maintenance on the RV, visited Jinnie and Roger

went shopping, cooked meals together, stopped for ice cream,

searched for property, and visited the original campground, which is really coming along and looking good!

Lara and Jeremy came over for a cookout with us at the campground, and we spent some quality time with them.

As we were discussing the fact that we keep hitting a dead end with the property, I mentioned, “Maybe we are looking in the wrong area. . . .” so we began to pray and consider a direction change. As a result, we went for a drive the day before I left. We drove about 90 minutes out to Boone NC, which is right in the Blue Ridge Mountains, and visited the headquarters for Samaritan’s Purse. We have both appreciated their ministry around the world, so were impressed with their facilities there. Though I was not at all dressed for it, we stopped by their Human Resources department. Annalou wanted to know when they might need volunteer help for the Christmas Child project this year. We probably spent almost an hour there talking to this one man about my experience in video production, and where we have lived and what we have done over the years. In the end, he asked me to please apply for their open position for a Video Editor to see if the Lord might be leading me there. I agreed to open that door.

On our way back, we stopped at their site in Wilksboro, but didn’t walk around because it was after normal business hours by then.

That night I revised my resume, put in the application, and sent it all in. We have no great hopes or expectations, but are open to considering that as a possible next step.  The ball is now in their court.

The next morning, Wednesday, September 8, we said goodbye,

and I left for work. I drove 446 miles to Harrison IL which is right on the line between IL and IN. In fact, I am to meet my driver at the scale house across the highway from the one that got smashed a few days ago. Apparently, while the weigh station was closed for the night, a truck fully loaded drove off the highway at full speed onto the weigh station ramp, and according to a witness walking her dog there, the truck never hit his brakes, but drove right into the weigh station building. The driver was killed at the scene, but no one was in the building.

We will leave there in the morning, and I will lead him as High Pole through a very skinny and windy road to Batavia OH where we will arrive in Batavia OH and load there in the afternoon.