An Explanation and Existentialism

It's more of an excuse, really, for the dearth of posts around here for so long. It's a poor excuse, I'll admit. But it's something to read at least, to change the look of this page that has undoubtedly become annoyingly familiar to you faithful few, if in fact you even still exist. And it comes with hope. You see, we had a busy summer; we turned around and realized that suddenly it was October. We'd been so busy visiting Iowa, playing music, going to festivals, trying to grow an herb garden, visiting a wine town on the Rhine, camping, hiking, climbing mountains, touring beautiful churches, shopping in Heidelberg, strolling along the river in Wiesbaden, going to a medieval festival, and planning a trip to Italy that, well, blogging about it was neglected. But enough of the excuse.

I said I'd offer hope, and I will. We hope to post pictures and some brief accounts of the things that have kept us from this blog. However, we're off to Italy in less than a week, and we foresee having a camera full of pictures and plenty of stories to tell you when we get back. So we may never truly get caught up. We can only offer to do our best. Our apologies if we come to disappoint you.

And one more thing: though I said we were busy, I didn't say it wasn't any fun. It should be clear by now that this blog is used primarily to document all the fun we're blessed with so abundantly. That's not to say, lest you be jealous, that we have loads of fun all the time, but who would want to read about the boring things? We do work and sleep and do a great number of dull but necessary things. We're learning there is virtue in being content in those things as well as the fun ones, which is hard to do at times when there is so much earthly pleasure to be had. It is a dream come true for both of us to be living in Europe right now, and we're behooved to heed the advice to enjoy it as much as we can while we can. But we find that we can't enjoy anything at all if we lack one vital thing. One man calls it Christian hedonism, others call it the chief end of man, and I refer to it simply as joy. Whatever it is called, I believe it can only be found in God, and oh what frustration comes when we forget this! Do remember this if ever it seems that we're trying too hard to impress with all the fun outings and adventures we document here. Too often it's true that we are being boastful at heart, until that unavoidable (yet wonderful) truth about joy comes along.

I said to the LORD, "You are my Lord;
apart from you I have no good thing."
Psalm 16:2