We just returned from the last great family adventure: a camping trip on the Maryland shore. Camping for our family means using a tent and cooking on a campstove or maybe even a campfire. No sissy pop up trailers or RVs for us. We were on Assateague Island; we pitched our tent maybe 200 yards from the surf. It was wonderful. We walked barefoot everywhere, we played in the waves, built a fire on the beach, got up early to watch the sun rise over the ocean. I realized as I sat on the beach with my kids that when I was younger the way I dealt with endings of pleasant things was by assuring myself that I'd do it again sometime. As a fourth grader the only thing that made leaving Disneyland bearable was the thought that I'd come back. As a young family we visited Pickett State Park in Tennessee, and I liked it so much we went back for three years in a row. One visit to Glacier Park wasn't enough, we had to go back again two years later. But on the beach I realized that I'll never be able to do this one again, not like this anyway. Grace is leaving home in six weeks. Oh, sure, I know she'll be back, but I also know it will never be the same. It was as though sitting on the beach I heard "time's up", and I knew it was true. I thought about how so many of my highest hopes and ideals have been set on earthly things, good things, but earthly, and how earthly things just don't last. Kids grow up. Parents eventually get too old to jump and play in the waves. I thought about how more and more of my heart is getting invested in heaven, where there is a better hope than even the best earth has to offer. I always thought that being on the beach in happiest harmony with just my husband and my two kids was the best-- but there must be something better up ahead.

In a camping supply store I found a tee shirt that is my souvenir of the vacation. It has a simple line drawing of a glass filled halfway, and it says "half full." My kids are growing up and willingly taking the gift of freedom we have granted them. My back is a little stiffer after a night of sleeping on the ground (but we still aren't stooping to RV camping!). My father in law (we saw him while en route) now walks with two canes. But the glass "ain't half empty." It's half full, and you know what? It's gradually getting fuller as we look forward to that something better.

Proverbs 31:25