There are very few front porches. Many houses are flush with the pavement or have a couple of steps up to the door and nothing else.

Most houses are made of brick, and people still lay it by hand.

Narrow rural roads

Streets are extremely narrow. Many a normal street is barely as wide as a typical Montanan alley.

I have seen very few potholes in my frequent biking, not like the ones you get in Missoula. Cobblestones, however, are brutal to bike over.

Cars are new and well-maintained. You almost never see old clunkers, or even cars more than five or ten years old.

Cars are also extremely small. You see a few vans, station wagons, and pickup trucks, but they are very much the exception. The average car is much smaller than the average car in the U.S. I did see a Subaru Forester once and stared at it in a bit of befuddlement. It’s such a Missoula sort of car.

Horse meat. In the grocery store. I haven’t tried it yet, but I’m going to. I have eaten duck, kangaroo, quail, and various new kinds of fish here.

There are no deer! I bike past fields and along rural farm roads which, in Montana, would have deer or antelope or something bouncing across them all the time, but there are none. The closest I get are burros in fields. Yes, actual burros.

Burros and/or donkeys in a field

On the other hand, the birds never stop singing. Apparently no one told Belgian birds that they’re supposed to fly south for the winter.

No two toilets flush the same way. Most have some variation on two different buttons, one to use a small amount of water and one to use a larger amount, but some of them have a Start button and a Stop button, and some have a lever thing you pull up on, and some of them have the buttons on the wall instead of on the toilet.

Speaking of toilets, there are very few automatic toilets or sinks.

Speaking of toilets, you have to pay to use them in public. Usually 35-50 cents.

Nearly every set of stairs I have encountered is some variation on a spiral.

You often have to bring or buy your own kitchen appliances like stovetops and things when you move into a new place you’ve rented. All I had to buy was a refrigerator.

Speaking of refrigerators, they’re tiny.

There are still plants growing in the fields. Until November or even the beginning of December there were still flowers blooming. So weird.

Everywhere you look, there’s a marvelous castle or old church. Belgium has more castles per square kilometer than any other country in Europe.

Buildings crammed together in Brussels.

Belgium has more everything per square foot than anywhere in Montana. By this I mean that everything is extremely close together. Villages are only a mile or two from each other. There’s a farmhouse on every hill. Houses are often tall and narrow and squished up against each other (even in villages). Major towns and cities are ten or fifteen miles from each other. There are no wide open spaces.

Most buildings are made out of brick, especially houses and apartments. People still lay brick by hand, with a trowel.

People kiss each other. All. The. Time. You haven’t seen somebody since yesterday? You kiss him on the cheek. You just met a new acquaintance? You kiss her on the cheek. Actually you kiss the air near their cheek. Once, in my first month here, I was at a French friend’s house for dinner, and someone I was unacquainted with was coming late from work. He came in and, since I was sitting closest to the door, came straight to me and stuck his face out at me. I had a momentary recoil of horror (What are you doing?), and he had a momentary recoil of rejection (What a rude person!), and everyone at the table burst out laughing and kindly explained to me that he was French and expected a greeting kiss on/near the cheek, the way an American would shake hands, and explained to him that I was American and new and wasn’t used to strange men sticking their faces in my personal space. We also ended up laughing at each other/ourselves.

The Belgian Synod Attestation is a statement from a religious body in Belgium attesting to the fact that you are a religious worker in official standing with a religious body in your home country which has official affiliation with the Belgian Synod. The application for it requires these documents:

• The application, which is longer and more complicated than the visa application.
• A notarized affidavit from the Assemblies of God that it is what it is and you are what you are in relation to it.
• A notarized letter from the Assemblies of God that it endorses your visa application and guarantees your salary.
• A notarized letter from your insurance company affirming that you have insurance that is effective worldwide.
• A list of your educational credentials.
• A photocopy of the official agreements between the Assemblies of God and the Belgian government or the Belgian Synod, or something Belgian.
• A photocopy of your passport.

6. All of this must be scanned and emailed to the nice person with AGWM who will pass it on to the Belgian Synod. It can take up to three months to get the attestation.
7. Select the FBI background check request as the second thing to do. Really it should have been the first thing. Tsk tsk.
8. Rush madly about all the tiny towns in the area of western Washington where you still are until you find a police station that is doing fingerprinting. Find out they require cash payments and run to the nearest ATM to get some. Get fingerprinted, which is a most interesting procedure.
9. Go to a Rite-Aid to buy a money order to send with the FBI background check request, and stand in line for ages only to find out they, too, require cash. Spend more money at an ATM to get more cash and stand in line for ages again. Get the money order.
10. Send in your fingerprints and request to the FBI. This can take up to 15 weeks to get back.
11. Finally go home to Montana and start packing your house.
12. Pack a lot.
13. Receive the original documents from AGWM that were sent in digital form to the Belgian Synod. Don’t lose them. I almost did.
13. Pack some more.
14. Find out from another missionary also going to Belgium all the absurd things you have to do for the medical form required for the visa. Realize you’re going to have to go to Billings (5 hours away) to get it apostilled (a governmental certification).
15. Suddenly receive the Belgian Synod Attestation in the mail with a lovely cover letter, only a month after you sent in the application.
16. Pack some more.
17. Find out from another missionary that if you send in your background check request to an FBI-approved channeler, you might get it way faster than you will from the FBI.
18. Rush madly about Missoula to find a place to get re-fingerprinted (electronically, which is also a very interesting procedure).
19. Send off your second background check request with an even larger fee.
20. Make a doctor’s appointment for the medical form. Make sure they know you have to have a notary present. Make sure they make sure the notary knows he or she has to have his or her notarial certification present.
21. Pack some more.
22. Study a lot of Dutch. Ik leren Nederlands graag.
23. Find out you actually have to go to Helena (3 hours away) instead of Billings for the apostilling of the medical form. You have to make an appointment and pay another fee.
24. Pack some more.
25. Sell a lot of stuff.

This is where I am presently. Here are the additional steps I know about but have not yet taken:

26. Go to your doctor’s appointment and have a lot of bloodwork done to certify the following:

And has found him/her free of one of the following illnesses as mentioned in the annex of the law of 15/12/1980 and representing a danger for public health :
1 Illnesses requiring quarantine as stated by the international health regulation n°2 dated 25 May 1951, of the World Health Organization;
2 Pulmonary tuberculosis, active or progressive ;
3 Other contagious or transmittable diseases by infection or parasites if they are subject in the host country to provisions of protection of the nationals

Who knows what these are?

27. Wait for the bloodwork to come back, possibly several days.
28. Pack some more.
20. Go back to the doctor’s and have the paperwork signed and notarized.
30. See if the notary will also notarize your signature on the visa application.
31. If not, find some other notary to do it.
32. Make an appointment in Helena for the apostilling. Send them a scan of the medical certificate first to make sure it’s been notarized properly.
33. Drive to Helena and get the medical certificate apostilled.
34. Hope desperately the FBI-channeler background check has come.
35. Make sure you have all the pertinent forms from AGWM. Make lots of copies of them.
36. Get a certified check in dollars from your bank made out extreeeemly carefully to the Consulate General of Belgium.
37. Place 2 copies of your visa application (which took about 3 minutes to fill out) tenderly and graciously into a large envelope with the following:

• Your passport
• A language form completely in Dutch explaining that you want all your paperwork in Dutch because you will be living in a Dutch-speaking section of Belgium. The other options are French and German.
• 3 passport photographs
• The originals and two copies of all the documents you already sent to the Belgian Synod
• The Belgian Synod Attestation
• The FBI background check
• The signed, notarized, apostilled, and bathed in camel’s milk (not really) medical certificate with two copies of the same.
• Yet another fee, the certified check.
• A self-addressed, self-stamped address so you can get back your passport and all the other documents, which you need to have in hand to get into Belgium.
•  Your firstborn child who can spin straw into gold (not really).

38. Take said envelope to the post office and give them a lot of money to send it very quickly to the Belgian Consulate in Los Angeles, which has jurisdiction over Montana.
39. Have your bank wire yet another fee, in Euros, to the Consulate.
40. Gnaw on your fingernails and pray it doesn’t take the possible two months that it could take, because by this point you want to be in Europe much sooner than that.
41. Pack some more.
42. Have a goodbye party.
42. Find out, oh frabjous day, that you have been issued a visa.
43. Make an appointment to receive it.
44. Fly to Los Angeles. Yes. Fly to Los Angeles to pick it up. You have never had any desire to go to Los Angeles—in fact you have sometimes in the past said to yourself that while San Diego is perfectly lovely, you never ever want to go to Los Angeles. Nevertheless, fly to Los Angeles.
45. Figure out how to get to the Belgian Consulate from the airport.
46. Do whatever you have to do at the Consulate to get the visa.
47. Go see the La Brea Tar Pits, because they’re like 3 blocks away.
48. Fly home again.
49. Buy a plane ticket.
50. Go to Belgium, taking care to bring all the reams of paperwork with you to bemuse the poor immigration agents.

This has taken you five months. But if all goes to plan, you will be celebrating your 35th birthday at a missionary convention in Croatia.

The rigors and demands of itineration are all ones which would seem to rely more on extraverted strengths than introverted ones. Hours most days are spent on the phone, trying to schedule services with pastors, and most introverts hate the phone. Every weekend entails a new church (or two), being the stranger in a large group of people, and standing about talking to people one has never met for an hour or more, another activity most introverts despise. Then the whole focus of the weekend, and ostensibly the whole focus of itineration, is the moment when the missionary must stand up in front of a group of people and be a public speaker—a cross between a preacher and a salesman. These three main aspects of itineration make the picture of itineration a nightmarish one for a classic introvert.

Thank God He is not constrained by stereotypes. I realized recently how thankful I am that itineration is very far from a nightmare for me, that I actually like it. Mostly. Yet I do everything I do as an introvert, not a pretend extravert. Mostly.

Telephone calls, I confess, are still the source of my greatest stress. I hate talking on the phone, to friends almost as much as to strangers. Every time I dial a number, there is a little shock of anxiety, or at least a discomfort, at the thought that someone may answer. This puts me in the conflicted state of hoping no one answers while desperately needing them to. I recently calculated that I have made nearly 3,000 phone calls in the last two years. Seriously, it’s the worst part of the job.

My listening face.

The second worst part is indeed meeting hundreds and thousands of strangers. Hey, now, you say with a stern frown at such an unloving attitude, these are your brothers and sisters in Christ. They are your supporters, in finances and in prayer. They are the lifeblood of the missionary. Yep. I agree with every word. That doesn’t make it one whit easier. I have always felt unbelievably awkward around strangers. Thankfully, I’ve been well-trained in the art of being polite and gracious, so I am desperately polite and gracious and let strangers hug me and tell me their stories of traveling in Germany in 1983, and all the while my poor brain is shrinking back against the walls of my skull and longing for someone to strike up a conversation about theology or Doctor Who.

Which sometimes someone does, and I want to keep him or her forever. That’s the other side of the coin, that in the midst of feeling unbelievably awkward and acting perfectly gracious, sometimes I meet someone whom I wish I could know better. Sometimes I meet someone who feels a connection to me, and then a perfect stranger chooses to support me with hard-won dollars and time taken to pray for me. Sometimes someone I will never see again says something to me that I will never forget. Sometimes hundreds of strangers combine into a complete church that encourages my socks off. The moments of awful, inward awkwardness are (usually) worth it.

And then there’s that great bugbear, that collective phobia, public speaking. Did you know that, supposedly, more people, introverts and extraverts alike, are afraid of public speaking than they are of death? (I am far more afraid of the dentist than I am of either public speaking or death…or at least I used to be, until I met my current dentist, but that’s another story.)

I’d done public speaking in 4-H (that was one of the worst experiences of my childhood…), taken speech and preaching classes in college, taken more preaching classes in seminary…and I hated every moment of every one of them until my very last sermon in my very last preaching class. That was when I realized I could put my creative writing skills into my sermon preparation and that I could put my acting skills into my sermon delivery and that I could infuse my learning and thinking and my own way of being into what I presented and how I presented it. And then I loved it.

My first two or three presentations as an itinerating missionary were very nerve-wracking, and then suddenly I settled into it and started loving it. In the first place, I’m getting to share God’s plan with God’s people. I’m getting to talk about something I’m passionate about. I’m getting to open people’s eyes to new and creative ways of being a missionary. I’m getting to offer them encouragement from my own experiences.

In the second place, I’m using all the skills I have developed over my life. I’ve always loved acting, and while I’m not acting a part when I speak in a church, I’m using what I learned about how to present myself on a stage, how to use my voice, how to address an audience. I’ve always loved theological and psychological depth, and I can put that into my presentations and use it to share my future with people who might not be used to thinking that way. I’ve always loved contextualization, and I find great enjoyment in altering my “usual” presentation to suit age groups and the cultural backgrounds of congregations and in incorporating things from the service I’ve learned about the group I’m speaking to. I’m using my introverted tendencies, in thinking and analyzing and studying, to add depth and enjoyment to what is a very extraverted activity. I am good at public speaking because I am an introvert, not because I’m faking being an extravert.

And then on the way home, I am deliciously alone. I have used up all my energy in the couple hours of church service, and then I get to go drive by myself for a couple of hours. I love traveling by myself. If you feel sorry for all the time I have to spend alone traveling around the country, you’re wasting your pity, because I relish it. I’ve seen so much of the country without having to consult another person or talk, and it’s terribly delicious, after all the talking I do on the phone and in church services.

Then also, because I’m single and live alone and don’t have an outside job, I spend loads of time alone at home, recovering from traveling and speaking, making phone calls (or dreading them), doing paperwork, cheerfully writing thank-you cards (I’ve written hundreds of thank-you cards, and it’s still one of the nicest parts of my job), and writing reams and reams of journal entries in order to reflect on, analyze, and incorporate into myself everything that has happened while I’ve been traveling and speaking and making phone calls.  I am on my 11th journal since this whole journey started in 2013; I have written 2,124 journal pages in 2 1/2 years. I love being an introvert.

All in all, there are aspects of itineration that appeal to extraverted strengths and aspects that appeal to introverted strengths. I am glad I am doing it as me.

An artist named Marah Sandoz has started a lovely gallery and art shop featuring art by herself and other local artists, and she has placed all over town nearly 60 larger-than-life-sized figures representing the town in the Victorian era. They’re lovely and charming and sometimes halfway hidden in unexpected, but appropriate places. I spent Monday morning walking around town and finding them all with a map Marah provides at her gallery.

I had spent the night at the Wildlife Motel, which is also charming and lovely, tiny but welcoming, run by a Christian family who treat it as a ministry. I recommend it as a place to stay. Not to mention that the countryside around Taylor is very lovely. I recommend that, too.

I was in western Washington three times between Christmas and Easter. Sometimes scheduling services just works like that. Once when I went, I got to take Highway 12 between Lolo, Montana, where my mom lives, and Napavine, Washington, where my sister lives, with two services along the way, and it was a truly magnificent drive.

In Washington, I got to stay with my sister, her husband, and their three rapidly-growing children each time I went, which is grand, because once I’m gone to Europe, I won’t get to see them in person. While there I conducted three (or four?) international teas with various groups at various churches and had a number of church services as well and a number of exquisite drives around northwestern Washington.

In March I went directly from Washington to South Dakota, where I spent a month traveling around to church services and staying between them with dear old professorial friends from Trinity in Ellendale, North Dakota, five miles north of the South Dakota border. I adore the Dakotas, and I was there just in time to see the immigration of massive flocks of birds, mostly geese. What an enchanting place.

After South Dakota, I had three district councils in a row, in North Dakota, Montana, and Idaho, where various ministry friends assisted me greatly by introducing me to loads of pastors. One of my weaknesses is in the area of networking, so I subsidized my lack by asking other people to help, and that worked beautifully. It was also very exhausting.

In a little over a week, I am off to Nebraska, where I have a month of services lined up. After that, who knows. Please pray that I’ll get July filled up with services. But pray especially that God’s plan will be accomplished throughout all of this and that both I and AGWM will have the patience to let His plan be what He wants it to be.

It’s not that I have nothing to write about. I’ve been traveling all over the country, more or less, and seeing lovely things and meeting lovely people and having lovely services. I kept thinking, I should write a blog post about that, and then not doing so.

The truth is that during November through January I was too discouraged to do so, really. Some of the things I write about take a lot out of me to write, and I simply didn’t want to. Yes, foreign missionaries are allowed to be discouraged, even when they’re perfectly convinced they are actually doing God’s will. There’s nothing about being a missionary that makes you automatically more holy and faith-filled and strong and all that. There is, however, that about the missionary journey (even just itinerating) that makes you grow quite quickly. Your faith will either increase, or you’ll lose it, I am convinced.

In my case, my discouragement was because I was quite certain God was going to do some sort of drastic, amazing thing to suddenly slay the giant or move the mountain (take your pick) of my budget so that I could get to Belgium on the timeline laid down by myself and AGWM, and He hasn’t done so. No slaying, no plunging of mountains into the sea, just one slow, dragging step after another. Well, honestly, it’s difficult not to be discouraged under such circumstances, isn’t it?

Eventually my natural optimistic, quietly cheerful nature reasserted itself, thank God, because being discouraged is very dull and unpleasant. Assisted, in great part, by God’s gentle, gradual reminding me of what I already know perfectly well, that He’s in charge and I’m just along for the ride.

But then I became very busy and had no time or mental energy for writing blog posts. Hopefully that has changed (not the busy but the mental energy part) and I will be able to carry on being my usual scintillating self. Or something. Prepare yourself for a deluge. Or something.

This is not remotely symbolic. It’s just awesome.

It seems like I’ve read a thousand blog posts on singleness recently, and while I’ve enjoyed a lot of them, it seems like they entirely deal with ways of convincing singles that singleness isn’t the worst thing ever. As if The Norm is hating to be single, feeling second-class, longing to change your state, feeling incomplete or unfulfilled by not being married. Maybe that is the norm. Maybe a lot of people need some encouragement in a difficult situation.

This is me, gently swinging and reading. With a pen, for underlining and making notes. And a photographer.

But I’ve read so many of these sorts of posts that I can actually start to think, Is there something wrong with me that I don’t hate being single? I would like to read a blog post from the point of view of someone who loves being single. So I figured perhaps I’d better write one.

This is not a blog post to convince you that you ought to love being single if you’re single and you hate it. This is a blog post talking about how being a single itinerating missionary works for me and what I’m really enjoying about it. (And the few things that are difficult.)

I should start out with the disclaimer that I don’t dislike marriage. I have wanted to be married my whole life, and I am indeed looking forward to a potential future marriage. Intellectual and emotional (and physical) intimacy appeals to me. So no sour grapes here.

The difference is, I’m really enjoying my present. I’ve discovered contentment in my current state. It’s really nice.

Being single and living alone has introduced me to independence. I grew up in a house of five children, three of whom were girls. The first time I ever had my own room was when I was a Junior in college, and the first time I ever truly lived by myself was when I was about 30. Until that point, I really enjoyed living with the people I’ve lived with, the interesting conversations with roommates, cooking together with my sister when we lived together, and so forth. But in living by myself in my own place, I’ve discovered the pleasures of living alone.

I love it that I have my own room (no snoring!) and my own kitchen, in short, that my house is mine. Everything is where I put it—which is not to say that it’s perfectly tidy by any means, just that the only messiness I have to deal with is my own. I can cook what I want when I want and still have it there in the refrigerator the next day (unless I ate it). My getting up, going to bed, eating, showering, and all that are not dictated by anybody else’s schedule, and I can hang my towel where I want and keep my window wide open in winter if I want. There are no debates about the temperature of the house or car (unless my sister comes over, at which point it’s an amusing novelty). I get to decide the most logical place to put the silverware and the olive oil and the bamboo steamer. I can play music all day long and not bother anyone (at least the neighbors haven’t complained…).  I can stay up late reading without the light bothering anyone, and I can eat amazingly healthy oatmeal (with figs and flax and coconut milk and nutmeg and maple syrup…nomz) or chocolate cake (it’s been known to happen) for breakfast at 1pm without deranging anyone else’s nutrition.

My schedule is my own. When I’m at home, I can choose to leave my house at any hour of the day or night without answering to anyone or answering questions or having to take anyone with me. My decisions about where I’m going and what I’m doing are completely independent. When I’m traveling, I can pack up and leave in an hour, and I am sure many a parent would envy me my ease of departure. I can decide at the last minute that I’m driving to church instead of biking and sleep in an extra fifteen minutes. I can suddenly decide to bike downtown for the art festival at 35° F without having to organize an entire entourage.

Bike. Did I mention my bike? This is The Blue Gale. One of my best friends.

I can come home from an exhausting spate of traveling and speaking and have delicious, blessed silence and solitude in my house for hours (or days) on end. I can invite someone over on the spur of the moment (it’s been known to happen) and not have to consult with anyone else about whether it’s alright.

I can sob deliciously about something God is teaching me and not have to answer concerned questions about whether I’m having a nervous breakdown. I don’t have to wait on anybody else’s college loans before applying for missions. I don’t have to worry about my calling fitting together with my husband’s or about whether moving to Europe will adversely affect my children. When I go to speak at a church, I’m not the missionary’s wife: I’m the missionary. I don’t have to try to balance adequate care of children with adequate attention to ministry. My life is exponentially simpler and more flexible because I am single.

You know, I’m beginning to feel sorry for all those poor married people out there who don’t get all these advantages. [Tongue only slightly in cheek.] Actually I’m not even entirely joking. I have come to love the flexibility of singleness so much that I’m beginning to be afraid I won’t ever want to change it.

All this has come as something of a surprise to me, simply because of how much I have always wanted to be married. I’m rather blessed with a few advantages that make singleness so fun: I love being alone and rarely get lonely, and I’m not very emotional or emotionally dependent upon other people.

Lest I make the wrong impression, let me say that I love community. I am so glad I am going to Europe, where the AG missions community is rich and close. But I like my own little hobbit-hole within a community, with elbow room and independence and flexibility. That’s got to be an advantage to the community as well, the flexibility of a single without family responsibilities.

But as promised, I have discovered a few distinct disadvantages of being single. Do you know how hard it is to change a light bulb when you’re short? Or zip up the back of a dress by yourself? Have you ever tried to lift a fairly heavy bicycle into the back of a car by yourself? Forget about trying to put it on top of the car.

Actually, I already have a butler. He is a knitted, stuffed Dalek (click on the picture to find out what a Dalek is) who spends all his time making tea, writing poetry, and trying to learn chess.

Those are hardly serious. I could hire a butler to do them. But there have been occasions recently in which I have, for the first time, been seriously jealous of married people, and that is in facing the struggle of itineration by myself. Mostly I like itinerating alone. I love traveling by myself and staying alone in a hotel room and quietly driving and thinking my thoughts.

But I am doing all the hard work alone. I am the secretary and the scheduler and the telemarketer (missions edition) and the salesman and the business manager and the accountant and the grantwriter and the tax preparer and the car mechanic (well, I did put in a headlight by myself…) and the emergency response person and the receiver of all the No’s and the person who decides where to go next and then person who has to have all the ideas and the person who sets up and the person who tears down and the navigator and driver and oil checker and windshield washer and the person who calls to confirm only to find I’ve been forgotten about and the thank-you letter writer and the person who has to be able to give a speech to 7-year olds and 16-year olds and 85-year olds and to cowboys and bankers and single mothers and the sole public face of the ministry I am going to be doing, the chatter and small-talker and listener and answerer of impossible questions, the emailer and Facebooker and blogger and newsletter writer and printer and addresser and stuffer, and I’m the person upon whom it all depends without a shoulder to cry on when I get overwhelmed and discouraged.

People encourage me, certainly, but it’s not the same as going through it together with someone, sharing the work, sharing the stress, supporting each other. (I don’t even want to think about how hard single parents have it, just in general.)

Well, God reminded me recently that I’m not actually doing this alone. Durr. He understands my weaknesses, and He’s not just the God who’s all-wise and makes perfect plans from afar: He’s the God who’s intimately with me, feeling how I feel, sympathizing with my weaknesses, going along with me while I’m calling and traveling and replacing headlights.

Even with all that…goodness, I love being single. And I love being a first-time itinerating missionary. I still would not want to be doing anything else. Any other job, any other state of being—it just wouldn’t be right. I am where I’m meant to be, and by George I like it.

Wyoming is a really incredible state. Random, crazy things to see everywhere you go. Also lots of antelope. Lots.

The most amazing thing I saw in Wyoming was a place called Hell’s Half Acre. It’s an escarpment.

Nebraska and Missouri are both less spectacular but more inviting.

In January, I was discouraged because I’d meant to start full-time itineration in the beginning of January and had to put it off until February because I hadn’t scheduled enough services for Headquarters’ approval, and also because I felt very much alone in the process (even though it was just the beginning). Missionaries who are married have a built-in support system (which is not to say that being married doesn’t have its own struggles), and I felt like I had none and like no one really cared what I was doing. Then a person from church sent me a card in the mail with words of encouragement in it, and then I went to the Montana District’s Ministers Renewal and was reassured that actually Montana does care about its itinerating missionaries. We were all introduced to the whole gathering, who were encouraged to welcome us to their churches, a top district official randomly gave me money, I had lunch with his wife, and a pastor I had known in my Bible Quiz days gave me a solid dose of unsolicited encouragement.

In February I started crying because my windshield wipers didn’t work in a freezing rainstorm. Probably it was really just because I was tired after a long weekend of traveling in blizzards and doing services and staying with strangers, but inanimate objects that don’t behave as they should have the capacity to make me crazier in the head than anything else. A three-hour drive turned into a five-hour drive, and I had to turn around twice and go back to a friendly Napa Autoparts to get my windshield wipers fixed, and I got stuck in the snow. Small problems indeed, but on the way home there was a rainbow in the snow, which rarely happens. (You can barely see it in this picture, but it’s there.)

Rainbow in the snow

In April, the truly hard part about itineration hit me. The raising money part. Last June or July, when I had my first interview for the missions application process, I was told that there were some people reviewing my application who wanted me to go to Europe as a short-term Missionary Associate rather than a fully-appointed missionary because they didn’t believe I could raise a full budget for Europe in Montana. Montana is a massive state with few churches, the majority of which are struggling financially. Blithely I declared that while I was willing to do what they thought was best, I had always intended on being fully appointed and I knew God could make it happen if He wanted it to. I have continued to believe that, but still, in the back of my mind has always been that naysayer…Headquarters doesn’t believe you can raise your budget… (which is not true: it was only one or two people on a vast committee). And now I see what they mean. I’d hoped to have $2000/month in commitments raised by the end of April, and I don’t even have $1000. Churches are so generous in giving me cash, and I’ve raised far more than I expected every month in offerings, but it is harder for them and for individuals to commit to what I really need, giving monthly, when they are poor, when there are so many missionaries, missions projects, and local ministries clamoring for them to give.

Then just at the end of last month, a friend mentioned to me something God was reminding her of in a difficult situation she is in: He is the God of the impossible. Then I went to Montana’s District Council, and the speaker the first night spoke on the council’s theme: “Mission: Possible.” His altar call was on asking God to restore one’s innocence when difficult situations have made one jaded. While I was praying (and crying, ‘cos that’s what I do), the same district official’s wife came and prayed with me and seemed to get a vast deal of encouragement of her own out of it. It was lovely.

Directly after, a board member from Trinity Bible College spoke to me about what I’m up to and how itinerating is going, and he reminded me that if I want people to give me money, I have to ask them. Durr. That’s kind of the hardest part. I’m jolly good at getting up and telling people all about my work and calling and so forth, but the part where I say, “I need you to give me money every month or I can’t go”…that part’s hard. I tend to forget it, or shy away from it. But he told me people expect me to ask and they’re disappointed if I don’t. So next Sunday, when I speak about missions in Europe, I will explain how expensive Europe is, and I will ask them to support me monthly. That will be hard. Because itineration is hard.

But, my goodness, it’s fun.

(P.S. Here’s a lovely link where you can go to support me in missions in Europe, if you want…)

*”Lover of God,” sort of a quote from Acts. 1:1 for no good reason at all.

Dearest Trinity Bible College, you were one of the best things that ever happened to me, but you sadly deceived me about itineration. I was led to expect it to be one of the worst things that could ever happen to a poor, innocent little missionary, and instead I’m having the greatest time ever.

Sunset near Havre, MT

First of all, I get to travel all over Montana. I’ve lived here nearly my whole life, but I never fully realized how extraordinarily beautiful so much of it is. I drove the most breathtaking road in a blizzard along a narrow, long lake between Eureka and Troy (click small pictures for the larger version):

I drove under a sky between Roundup and Billings that made me realize why it’s called Big Sky Country.

Big Sky Country

I encountered all kinds of interesting buildings in all kinds of unexpected places.

I could upload a thousand more pictures. But what a magnificent time I’ve had driving.

Speaking at the missions banquet at my church in Missoula

And then, second of all, I get to do public speaking. Preaching, even.

Erm…shouldn’t I hate that? I’m supposed to hate that. I’m an introvert. Stereotypically, I should not like speaking in front of groups of people. But I love it.

I’m a good speaker. I can craft a good speech/sermon/presentation/message because I’m a good writer, and I’ve done enough acting that getting up in front of people has become easy. I know how to tailor my message to age groups, different group sizes, and the length required by any given church service, and I still love what I’m talking about. I tell people my story, quite honestly and transparently, and they love it. I bring them encouragement, inspiration, and a perspective that, quite frankly, most people have never considered. And of course I talk about missions in Europe, and most people have not thought much about that, either.

Third of all, I meet people. Honestly, that’s one of my least favorite parts. It’s one of the most difficult parts. I find it a trifle uncomfortable to meet new people and try to think up things to say to them. Someone is sure to monopolize me with a story about her hip surgery or what his nephew is studying at the University of Montana, and there is always a woman who asks how old I am and is shocked by the answer and always a man who says “It’s all Greek to me.”

My name in Gallifreyan. Yes, that’s a language.

But at the same time, some of my favorite memories are of people I have met. A young man in Cut Bank gave me my name in Gallifreyan (the language of the Time Lords in Doctor Who). A mother and daughter in Havre had truly lovely discussions about missions and literature with me. I went exploring antique stores in Laurel with a woman who, with her husband, opened their house to me for four nights. An old man in Thompson Falls who looked like Peter O’Toole flirted with me and gave me $1000, just because he could (I would have flirted back, but my flirting needs work; I’m not a flirter).

In between, I get a few days at home, in my own comfy bed, with my own washing machine and my own kitchen and my lovely bicycle, and I don’t have to do anything except paperwork, try to schedule more services, write thank-you notes, study Greek, read books, and write them. The traveling, speaking, meeting people, and conversation-making-with-strangers can get very tiring, but the days in between more than make up for it.

Three months in, itineration is grand.