Sojourn: A temporary stay

Sojourn. I see this word all the time at work because it's all over the Bible. It often seems to have a negative sense, though, probably because in many of the cases where "sojourn" appears, the people who are making a temporary move aren't doing so out of choice as much as necessity. Abraham, the 12 sons of Jacob, and Ruth's mother-in-law, Naomi, all sojourned to escape famine. Jared and I are sojourning to escape becoming illegal aliens in Canada. But enough of the dramatics. :)

As many of you know, we've had a bit of trouble getting Jared the work permits he needs to continue living and working in Canada. This Thursday, after weeks of deliberating whether this would be the right choice, we decided to pack up our little car and head due south across the border into Washington.

I always hope that this is what a moving day will look like:

(Can you tell I love posting pictures of my bike?)

It ended up looking more like this, which is still fairly simple:

Staying optimistic that our move will in fact be only temporary and that we'll soon receive our paperwork, we only took about two weeks of essentials--we can take trips later to retrieve the rest if needed.

Fortunately for us, the Young Life community is amazingly supportive of its employees. We're currently staying at a beach house in Birch Bay that was generously loaned to us by a wonderful Young Life couple who lives in Bellingham. We love our little basement apartment in Langley, but I won't lie, this place is quite the upgrade.

Three bathrooms? A deck with a grill overlooking the marina? A 5 minute walk to the beach? Sounds good to me :)

So for the next two weeks, we'll be living in relative luxury and enjoying our stay back in our native land. But we'll both be crossing our fingers and praying that this move will indeed be only temporary.